Collision
by Ayien
Summary: When the wars are over, where can soldiers go? The pilots, wounded and broken in both body and mind, are thrown into the universe of mutants, and meet with the most famous team of mutants devised. The Xmen.
1. Suicide

Warnings: Drug abuse, major character death, mention of rape, angst.

Genre: Romance/Angst/Drama

Definite Romantic Pairings: Quatre/Trowa

Potential Pairings: Logan/Heero, Wufei/Duo, Duo/Pyro, Duo/Remy, Wufei/Pietro

* * *

The sun was setting.

Quatre Raberba Winner stepped out of his car, greeted by the dubious sight of one Chang Wufei and Duo Maxwell actually having a sane conversation that didn't consist of battle strategy or insults. Duo looked up, laughing violet eyes now dark with pain, sorrow, and a resigned hope. His chestnut braid was flipped over one shoulder, the end frayed and worn from his nervous chewing.

Wufei fared no better; dark circles rimmed his obsidian eyes, and his ebony hair, usually gleaming with health and tied tightly back, now hung free, dull and lusterless.

"Hey Q!" Duo greeted, striding over to meet the shorter man. His lanky height towered over the blonde, forcing Quatre to look up to greet him. Duo bent down and the two of them kissed each other's cheek in affection; they were the most physically affectionate out of the five pilots. Wufei appeared by Duo's side, giving the former pilot of Sandrock a dignified embrace.

Duo smiled sadly at Quatre, noticing how their time apart had changed the angelic-looking businessman. His skin was paler then usual, cheeks nearly sunken from long hours of stress and nights filled with screams. His blonde hair, stiff and dry, hung limply, shadowing his dulled blue eyes.

"Where's Trowa?" Quatre asked, curiously looking around for the emerald-eyed acrobat. Wufei answered, "He's here. He had to say goodbye to Catherine, first." Quatre nodded somberly, again reminded of their purpose in gathering in the wooded field. The sun painted the grass crimson red, as though splashed with the blood of the victims of war.

Just then, Trowa Barton jogged out from behind a tree, his characteristic bang flickering in the wind. Time had not been kind to the tallest of the Gundam pilots; his frame now seemed shrunken, swimming in the jeans and turtlenecks that used to fit him so well. He walked with his shoulders slumped, startling green eyes brightening for a moment as he caught sight of the small gathering.

"Hello," he said softly, wrapping Quatre up in a firm, warm hug. Those two, out of the pilots, had always had a special bond; Duo liked to think that it was because Quatre had nearly killed Trowa. He had joked about that sending a bad message; nearly kill your comrade, become best friends for life!

"Heero'll be here soon," Duo said confidently, American accent brazen and ringing across the silent field. Wufei, hand resting idly on the hilt of his sword, nodded; if there was one thing that the elusive Heero Yuy was, it was punctual.

Just then, as if summoned by Duo's utterance of his name, Heero Yuy, the Perfect Soldier, arrived in their midst. Dressed in black slacks, dark blue shirt, and a worn jean jacket, he nodded coolly to each of them.

Time and pain had inflicted their ravages upon him as well; his skin seemed shockingly pale and translucent, dark blue veins running a delicate tracery beneath the skin. The sharp bones of his face and shoulders jutted out alarmingly, corded muscles and sinews shifting under his skin. His dark, fathomless blue eyes rested on each of them, calculating their health, before he spoke in his nearly-nasal voice.

"Hello Duo, Trowa, Quatre, Wufei. You all know why we have come here, affirmative?"

They all nodded silently; indeed they knew. Heero would only have summoned them for one purpose, and that was to allow them to say their final goodbyes to him.

They had all known that someday this day would come; Heero was never meant to survive in a time of peace. While all of them were damaged irreparably, it was only Heero who was broken, only Heero who had to die.

Duo glanced around the circle, a sardonic smile on his face. The paranoia that had been instilled in each of them was alive and well; he knew by the twitching, flickering eyes, the tense hands, ready to throw a punch. He knew all too well that each one of the young men gathered in this field was a walking arsenal in themselves: he alone carried over twenty small throwing knives concealed in his boots and pants, a gun in a concealed holster, and two spring-loaded sheaths on his forearms. Heero, by far, was the most paranoid; God only knew how many weapons he carried as a matter of course.

"I want to thank you all for coming," Heero said stiffly, looking at each of them for a moment. "I know that during the-" he paused for a moment, eyes glazed- "-during the war, I never told you, any of you, that you meant something to me. I will now rectify that mistake." The other four young men blinked rapidly, forcing tears away. Heero Yuy, the boy-how stupid a word for one so old- who had saved the world, given up life, sanity, happiness, was going to die. They had known this was coming, but they had never said a word to each other, never considered the possibility of trying to talk him out of it. "I-" Heero said haltingly, seeming to struggle with the unfamiliar terrain of emotion- "I care very much for each one of you.

Wufei, thank you for providing me a guideline and teaching me how to meditate." A slight smile curled his lips as he met the Chinese man's eyes, remembering Wufei's frustration when he had tried to explain the concept of meditation to him. He hadn't understood the concept of having an empty mind, saying logically that it was impossible, as the mind was always at work. Wufei smiled in return, but it was shadowed by sorrow, nodding his acknowledgment.

"Quatre, thank you for giving me many safehouses to hide in, and teaching me the concept of feeling." Quatre gave a choked laugh at the mention of safehouses; he had torn most of them down, feeling that they were too laden with pain and regret to live in. He had indeed taught Heero the concept of feeling, but Heero had still locked his ability to feel away, finding that it was a weakness. Only now did the billionaire realize the immense sacrifice Heero had made by giving up all expression of emotion.

"Trowa, thank you for doctoring me after my self-destruction, and teaching me the value of having a traveling companion." Trowa smiled in response, remembering the long, lonely nights where he had sat by Heero's bedside, watching the bandaged, broken body struggle to take just one more breath, the fragile heart to pump just once more. He remembered the cold European nights, and the pride he had felt in his comrade as Heero offered his life to Sylvia Noventa in reparation for his sins.

"Duo, thank you for stopping me when I tried to kill Relena, and teaching me the idea of friendship." Duo flashed him a cocky grin, his memory of that night as sharp as ever. He remembered Heero's dark, cold blue eyes, his unnatural speed and ability to ignore the pain of having two bullets lodged in him. He remembered staring down the barrel of Heero's gun, and seeing the blue eyes widen as Heero lowered the gun, sealing the first, fragile stirrings of friendship.

Heero stepped away from the circle, turning his back to them as he stared at the blood-red sun. "Will you stay until my heart stops?" he asked softly. Duo threw himself forward, wrapping his lanky arms around Heero's thin shoulders. The other three joined them, Trowa laying a hand on Heero's shoulder, Wufei snaking his arm around his back, and Quatre leaning into his chest, arms joined around Heero's waist.

"You know you don't have to ask that," Trowa said softly, almost in reproach. Even now, it seemed that Heero had a hard time trusting them, but they were the only people he would ever allow this close. That had to count for something. Heero stepped away from their embraces, bending over and removing something from his boot that gleamed like fire.

One of Wing's feathers, perfectly formed, glittered in the sunlight as he turned to face them, a rare, wonderful smile spreading across his face.

"Thank you all for teaching me what it means to be a family."

The feather descended, slashing his wrists as surely as any knife. Red blood erupted, but Heero made not a sound. Calmly he lowered himself to the ground, stretching out to stare at the cloudless sky.

The other pilots arranged themselves around him, Duo holding Heero's head in his lap, tenderly stroking his hair, Quatre, Wufei, and Trowa sitting by his side, safeguarding the former Wing pilot's passage.

Heero was finally happy, finally at peace with the knowledge of his death, so rapidly approaching.

The universe, however, was not. With the impending death of the Heart of Space, Time made its own decision, flinging the pilots back into the past, to the only era where the Heart of Space and his companions could find healing.

A white light exploded from the earth itself-

A cold light-

A dead light-

A light like the eyes of Satan-

And then it faded.


	2. Meetings

Doctor Charles Xavier, Headmaster of Xavier's Institute for the Gifted, mutant telepath, and leader of the X-men, had a pounding headache. This was normal for him; having all the voices of the one hundred occupants of his school chattering loudly in his head can do that to you. Jutting his jaw out in defiance of his pain, he rolled his wheelchair into the odd sphere of Cerebro, picking up the helmet and settling it firmly on his head.

Everyday he performed a periodic, worldwide sweep for new mutants; usually only two or three manifested their power per day, and if they were potentially harmful or uncontrolled, he would dispatch one of his teachers to invite them to come to the Institute. Most accepted, some didn't. It was the way of the world. Quickly performing a mental 'check-up' on the Morlocks and Brotherhood, he began to sweep the world for new mutants.

Africa, North America, South America, and Europe passed without incident. One young woman's mutation had just become active, but hers was harmless, simply the ability to create little colored orbs of light. Moving into Asia, he looked it over; finding no new mutants, he began to withdraw-

Only to be savagely blasted with unimaginable psychic power that tore through his brain, exploding past synapses and ripping through all the barriers he had so painstakingly built in his mind. Fighting his way through blinding pain, he managed to home in on the source of power, located in a small field outside Kyoto. Five mutants, all male, was all he had time to process before unseen hands ripped the helmet from his head.

Groaning, he opened his eyes, meeting Jean's worried emerald ones.

"Professor!" he heard her shout, Scott Summer hovering worriedly behind her.

Blinking hard, he managed to gasp, "I'm fine, Jean. Quickly, call the X-men together!"

The members of the elite fighting force of mutants, the X-men, sat silently around a conference table, their varicolored gazes fixed firmly on the Professor. Xavier looked around, gaze resting on each one of them, dressed in their fighting uniforms.

Logan, Ororo, Scott, Jean, Kurt, Kitty, Rogue, and Evan waited patiently for their instructions, Logan growling intensely under his breath. Ororo gave him a reproving look, returning her gaze to the Professor.

"X-men," he began, "I was performing my routine search for new mutants today, when an extremely powerful blast of psychic energy hit me, the source a small gathering of mutants. I managed to find their location: it's a small field, three miles north of the boundary of Kyoto in Japan. There's five of them, all male. I couldn't discover their power; Jean rescued me from Cerebro before I was killed." He smiled at her for a moment, continuing, "We're going to find them, investigate, and hopefully bring them back here. I'll be coming with you. Hank will watch the school while I'm gone."

The clatter of chairs filled the room as Jean, Scott, Kurt, Kitty, Rogue, and Evan bolted towards the hangar, squabbling loudly on the way over who got to sit shotgun. The adults listened indulgently before Charles turned to Logan and Ororo, cautioning, "I don't know their names or ages, but I know that each of them has great power, and great sorrow as well. We must be very cautious."

The Blackbird hovered in the sky, a loud roaring announcing its presence. It landed with a soft thump, the wheels sinking into the soft, loamy soil. Logan, dressed in his infernal orange Spandex, flicked several switches, powering the jet down. Rogue, sitting triumphantly in the shotgun seat, growled when she realized the ride was over, and so, therefore, was her privilege.

Professor Xavier, riding in a wheelchair specially designed by Hank to handle rough terrain, was first down the ramp, followed by the others. Ororo squinted sullenly at the sky, disliking the blood-red sunset and wanting to change it to a cloudless, indigo spectacle. "Don't use your powers, Storm," Xavier spoke, "We don't want to warn them that we're here."

Logan suddenly stiffened, growling lowly. "I smell blood, and lots of it. This way!" With the speed of- well, a wolverine- he plunged off into the woods, followed by the others. Kurt teleported from tree to tree, the forest quickly filling with the scent of sulfur. Ororo and Jean flew, Kitty phased through the trees, the Professor rode his motorized wheelchair, and Evan, Scott, and Rogue were reduced to tromping through the forest, following Logan's receding form.

Storm flew ahead, landing gracefully beside Logan. She looked out into the field and gasped, one hand flying to cover her mouth at the sad and macabre tableau. The five mutants all seemed to be teenagers, at best, maybe nineteen at the oldest.

The one closest to them was obviously Chinese, wearing a ceremonial white outfit, with a sword, obviously well-used and well-loved by the tattered condition of the hilt, hanging from his belt. His obsidian hair hung to his shoulders, ebony eyes sharp and flinty-hard as his gaze swept the area, passing over them as he guarded the other four boys faithfully.

A short, fragile-looking blonde, dressed in gray slacks and a white shirt- attire that rightfully belonged in a boardroom- sat beside the Chinese man, light blue eyes, filled with sorrow, turned downwards as his pale, feminine hands held the hand of a dying boy tightly.

The tallest was a lanky European, walnut-brown hair styled into an impossible, gravity-defying bang, covering closed, cool emerald eyes. He seemed to be the most muscular of the five, but somehow, he looked shrunken and tired, dressed in a green turtleneck and well-worn jeans. He was also holding the hand of the boy who seemed to be the center of it all.

An astonishingly feminine-looking man sat cradling the head of the failing young man, his long braid of luxurious chestnut, nearly hip-length, flipped idly over one shoulder. He was dressed- how odd, Ororo thought- in the clothing of a priest, his mobile mouth, seemingly suited to laughter, a sober line, amazing violet eyes damp.

The young man they were all holding had dark, chocolate-brown hair that had seemingly never been introduced to a brush. His eyes were closed; looking closely, Ororo could see the remnants of a deep, golden tan, but now his skin was so pale it rivaled Rogue's. His outflung hands were covered in drying, dark red blood, pumping slowly from his slit wrists with every beat of his heart. A metal feather rested gently on his chest, rising and falling as his lifeblood departed his body.

"I think they attacked him," Logan said softly, "But if they did, why do they all look so remorseful? Doesn't make sense. I don't like things that don't make sense." Muted gasps and groans reached their ears as the others saw the sad scene; dimly Logan heard Kitty throwing up against a tree, and the crackle of Kurt activating his holographic projector.

Slowly, the group of nine stepped forward from the trees. Jean and Scott flanked the Professor, Storm and Logan on the outskirts. The Chinese man's eyes snapped to them immediately, rage evident in every tight, tense line of his body. Jean stepped forward and began to say "Hello"-

Only to be stopped, as in the blink of an eye, four cold, unwavering gazes were fixed on her. The braided man was holding two throwing knives in his hands, and he had the competent steadiness of one who knew how to use them. The young man with green eyes was pointing a gun in their direction, the safety off and ready to fire. Even the seemingly peaceful-looking blonde had a pistol trained in their direction. The Chinese man's sword was out of the sheath, the red light of the sun washing down the blade in a poor imitation of blood.

Jean held up her hands and continued to speak, "I know you all must be very confused right now. I was, too, when my mutation manifested itself." At the word 'mutation,' the four teenagers looked at each other for a moment, seeming to communicate without words, before the one with the bang asked in a smooth baritone,

"What year is it?" Jean glanced, confused, at Scott, before saying,

"It's the year two-thousand-five." The young men's eyes narrowed, and their gazes once again turned to each other for a moment, before moving back to the X-men.

"Did you kill him?" Kurt said with an astonishing lack of tact, gesturing to the dying boy on the ground. The odd mutants stared at him for a moment, rage steadily building in their gazes as the braided boy spit out in a rough American accent,

"How _dare_ you say that! Just who are you people anyway?" Professor Xavier rolled forward, raising his hands in a gesture of peace.

"We're mutants, just like you. If you'll come with us, we will take you to a place where you won't be persecuted, and where you can learn to control your powers." With each word he spoke, tenseness and confusion grew in their gaze. "We can heal your companion, too," the Professor offered.

The Chinese boy laughed, a harsh bark of a sound that had no mirth in it. "How can you say that, you idiot? No one, and I mean _no one_, can help him." Logan bristled at the insult, stepping forward, only to freeze as a throwing knife whizzed past his face, cutting off a small square of his mask as a threat.

"May we know your names?" Ororo inquired gently. Again, they looked at each other for a moment before turning back.

"I'm Duo Maxwell," the braided boy introduced himself.

"I'm Quatre Winner," the blonde said coolly, assessing them.

"I am Chang Wufei, but you will call me Wufei," the Chinese boy said stiffly, condescension in his every word.

"You may call me Nanashi," the boy with startling emerald eyes said softly.

Logan snarled, "That's not a name. You said you want us to call you 'No-name.' Well, we're not going to, so tell us your real name!"

The boy gazed at him levelly, nearly freezing him with the coldness of his gaze. "Very well, then. You may call me Trowa Barton. And this-" he gestured to the boy sprawled out on the ground-

"-is Heero Yuy."


	3. New Home

The Blackbird roared through the sky, but it's high, keening whine was nowhere as impressive as the deep rumble of a Gundam, Duo thought idly, lounging on one of the soft seats, running his fingers through Heero's bloody hair. The four former pilots sat in the back of the plane, watching each other carefully. Heero was wrapped in a blanket and lying across his and Wufei's laps, two tourniquets fastened tightly about his forearms to keep him from losing anymore blood. Trowa, sitting across from him, raised a hand, fingers beginning to flick into complex configurations, the coded sign language that the doctors had taught each of them for use in covert communications. Out of habit, he used his callsign at the beginning, something they had been taught to do.

(03- These 'mutants' are quite strange.)

(02- Yeah, that 'Logan' guy doesn't seem to like us very much.)

(04- I'm more concerned about whether or not we are in the past. My Space Heart-) Quatre paused in the middle of his communication, organizing his thoughts before continuing,

(My Space Heart tells me that indeed we are in the past. Back home, I could always detect life coming from the stars, where the colonies were. Here, there's nothing.)

(05- We must be sure not to tell anything about our pasts or the Gundams. I'm not sure whether we should hide our real capabilities. Also, what exactly are these 'powers' they keep talking about?)

(02- I don't know, but I hope I have a cool one, like being invisible, or flying, or-)

(05- Duo.)

(02- Yes, Wuffers?)

(05- Shut up.)

Duo turned and stuck his tongue out at Wufei, violet eyes sparking with the prospect of a new adventure.

"What's that?" Kitty asked, fascinated with the fast signing. She shrank back into her seat as the new mutants stared at her for a moment, Duo smirking as he said carefully,

"It's a language we devised ourselves." Scott stared suspiciously at them through the red quartz of his visor; he was curious about the new mutants, especially the silent, bloodied one that lay stretched across Duo and Wufei's laps.

The one with green eyes- Trowa, if he remembered correctly- sat silently beside the blonde, his unnerving eyes roving over the occupants of the plane for a moment before he asked in his soft voice,

"Why are you all wearing those hideous uniforms?"

Scott and Jean bristled angrily and were both about to speak, only to be cut off by Duo chiming in, "Yeah! That guy with the visor on, the way you've got that yellow 'X' on your chest, you're basically saying, 'Here I am, shoot me!'"

"Speaking of which," Quatre said diplomatically, "I don't believe we know your names. Please, enlighten us." The nine teenagers glanced at one another before Scott, as their leader, elected to speak for them.

"I'm Scott Summers, also known as Cyclops. My power is optic blasts."

"I'm Jean Gray. My power is telekinesis."

"I'm Kitty Pryde, called Shadowcat. I can phase through objects."

"I'm Evan, A.K.A Spyke. I can create bone spikes."

"I'm Kurt Wagner, also called Nightcrawler. I can teleport."

"I'm Rogue." She elected to leave out her power; perhaps she could become friends with these silent young men, and she couldn't do that if they knew that touching her would knock them out.

Storm turned around, offering kindly, "I'm Ororo Munroe, called Storm. I can control weather. This is Logan-" She gestured towards the uncommunicative man that was flying the plane- "-he's called Wolverine, and he has a healing factor."

The new mutants stared at each other for a moment, and then they all looked at the bloodied boy as Duo said softly, "Like Heero, almost." Logan, hearing it, glanced back for a moment, before turning his attention to landing the Blackbird. Ororo finished, "This is Professor Charles Xavier; he's a telepath."

The four young men's eyes narrowed sharply as they stared at Xavier, seeming to weigh his worth. "You can hear our thoughts?" Wufei voiced suspiciously, obsidian eyes glaring darkly at the bald man in the wheelchair.

"Yes," the Professor replied calmly, seemingly unruffled by their dark, cold eyes. "I can also see memories, but I never go into someone's mind without permission." Trowa's lip curled in an instinctive sneer at that; no one needed permission. Miidi Une hadn't needed permission to betray him; Doktor S hadn't needed permission to destroy his life and mind.

The Blackbird landed with a thump, and Trowa stood, gently gathering Heero into his arms. "Scott will show you to the Medical Center," the Professor said as he rolled out of the Blackbird, "Where Hank can take care of your friend."

Trowa stopped short, Wufei, Quatre, and Duo coming to flank him as Wufei voiced strongly, "Heero doesn't need a doctor." Ororo frowned, pushing gently, "He's lost a lot of blood; of course he needs a doctor." The Oriental youth glared at her, saying firmly, "Heero doesn't need a doctor. If anyone is going to take care of him, it will be us."

The Professor nodded assent, allowing the new mutants to descend from the plane. His brow furrowed as they took only a passing glance at the venerable red-brick building before striding towards the door; usually even the most privileged mutants gasped when they saw the Institute for the first time.

Duo snorted; did they expect them to be _impressed_? They had seen much bigger and gaudier buildings in the Sanq Kingdom! The quartet ascended the steps, waiting patiently for a moment as the others followed them.

"Logan, please show them to the rooms on the north hallway of the second floor," the Professor requested. Logan grunted his acceptance and began tromping towards the staircase, his orange Spandex standing out brightly against the dark cherry-wood paneling.

He ascended it carefully, keeping all his senses trained on the boys coming up behind him. He could have sworn that Duo had said that Heero had a healing factor. He was more then a bit angry at that; he had always been the only one with a healing factor, and he was actually jealous, as petty an emotion as that might be.

"Here," he said brusquely, gesturing at the two doors that faced each other. "One room's got three beds, the other two. Take yer pick." The small blonde turned to face him, saying, "We'll stay in one room together, if you please." Logan scowled; it seemed that these new students were going to delight in turning every convention on its head! "Fine," he snapped, "Take the one on the left."

Duo went through it first, moving along the walls to take a post in the far corner. Wufei did the same in the opposite corner. Quatre stepped forward and walked easily to the window, his body language masking the tension he felt. Trowa came last, bearing Heero. Walking to the bed farthest from the window, he set the unconscious former pilot on the bed, smoothing his blood-soaked hair away from the clammy forehead before he stepped away.

Logan, watching silently, was actually impressed; the four boys moved with the silent grace and speed of assassins, their scoping out the room practiced and easy. They seemed almost too practiced; far beyond the level of all the Covert Ops groups he had practiced with. Where had they come from, he wondered pensively, that they would need to be so skilled in masking their paranoia?

Quatre turned away from the view of the Institute grounds, nodding the 'all-clear' to the others. "We'll need to change Heero's bandages," Wufei said softly, his gaze flicking over to Logan significantly. Logan, noticing their stares, grunted and left his post in the doorway. Dimly they could hear his pounding footsteps descend the staircase, becoming softer the further he moved away.

Duo took his post by the door, ready to turn away any who might attempt to come in. Quatre knelt beside Heero and began pulling off his blood-soaked jacket and shirt, exposing a slim, silver-scarred torso. Trowa searched through the three bureaus, surfacing with a white shirt that he quickly tore into strips. Wufei took the strips and, with surgical precision, stripped the bloody bandages away and tied the new ones on, stopping to check that Heero's healing factor had kicked in.

The torn skin was pulling together as he watched it, scabbing over for a moment, before pink, fresh skin replaced it, quickly lightening to silver. Grunting in satisfaction, he tied the new bandages on, slipping two fingers beneath to check the tightness. Trowa tossed him another shirt, which Quatre wrestled onto Heero's limp form.

Heero twitched in their grip, shockingly dark blue eyes flickering open to pin them in their places. Quatre and Wufei raised their hands, backing away; although Heero trusted the other pilots beyond all others, his paranoia was still an integral part of him, and it was unlikely that it would ever leave. Heero glanced around the room, confirming everyone's presence, before he began to speak in a clipped tone.

"Status?"

"You've lost about three pints of blood; your body is still replenishing it, so you can expect to feel a bit weak," Duo said succinctly, leaning against the door.

"Location?"

Trowa smiled wryly, replying, "Apparently we've managed to land ourselves in the year 2005, with a group of people that are called 'mutants.' They all have abilities, like teleportation or telepathy."

Heero absorbed the information quietly with no sign of surprise, agile mind quickly formulating a strategy. "They will attempt to interrogate us. We must give them no information about our pasts, our Gundams, or where we are from. If they ask about our family, say you have none. If they ask about your origin, say the name of a city that matches your ethnicity. If they ask how we came together, say we were on the run from-" he looked around, accepting suggestions.

"We were on the run from the government." Duo suggested. Heero stared at him, saying, "Cause?" Quatre sat crosslegged on the bed next to him, elaborating, "They have many covert defense systems in place. I noticed what seemed like laser guns hidden in statues and bushes on the lawn."  
Heero nodded, continuing, "We were on the run from the government, and met in Berlin. You all have knowledge of before-colony history, correct?" They all nodded, Wufei snorting at the insinuation that he _wouldn't_ have knowledge of history. Heero looked around, noting the pastel yellow shade of the walls and the white blinds, covertly scanning for bugs. The others let him, well-accustomed to his paranoia.

A knock on the door made them whirl around, Heero with his gun trained on the doorway, Duo with a knife, Wufei with his sword, and Quatre and Trowa with pistols. The door swung open-

And Scott stepped in, face paling rapidly as he saw three guns pointed with deadly intent at him. Blinking, he attempted to even his voice out, saying with trembling calm, "The Professor wants to see you all in the small living room, so you can ask any questions you may have. Afterwards, one of the staff will interview each of you separately, in order to get your information for the resident database. How are you feeling?" This last was directed at Heero, who glared suspiciously at him, Prussian blue eyes dark with knowledge that no one should have the right to know, before he said in a clipped, flat tone, "My condition is satisfactory."

Scott raised an eyebrow above his crimson glasses, noticing the fresh white bandages and long-sleeved shirt that Heero was wearing. The five new mutants glanced at each other, seeming to do their unnerving telepathic communication, before each of them lowered their weapons, Wufei sheathing his sword, the others secreting them away someplace. Scott left the room, calling over his shoulder, "I'll lead you there!"

The former pilots entered the room cautiously, their eyes flickering about and cataloguing the locations of the occupants. Suddenly Doctor Henry McCoy lumbered in the room, big blue-furred face grinning openly, only to change to shock in the blink of an eye when five guns (Wufei having elected to change his weapon) were trained unerringly on him, five cold, stony gazes glaring at him over the barrels.

"It's all right," the Professor said calmingly. "This is Doctor Henry McCoy, or as we like to call him, Hank. I realize his appearance is frightening, but he's really a very kind person, when he's not endeavoring to stick needles in you."

It seemed impossible, but the temperature in the small room dropped even more, the eyes of the young men flinty-hard and suspicious. Hank raised his hands, grinning nervously as he spoke, "There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, then are dreamt of in your philosophy.' Hamlet, by the great bard Shakespeare."

Duo swore angrily as he holstered the gun, his nerves still tense and jangling from the shock. Trowa, Quatre, and Wufei followed suit, Heero flicking the safety on but leaving it in his hand. As one, they moved to sit on the couch facing the doorway, Quatre and Wufei sandwiched between the other three.

"Ah, you must be Heero," Xavier said peacefully, asking, "Do you feel all right? You lost a lot of blood." Heero's dark gaze flicked to him, rattling the older man.

Those dark blue eyes were so cold, so haunted, as though the fire of Heero's soul had gone out eons ago, leaving nothing but dead remnants screaming forever in the silence of those empty eyes. They were so blank, so lost, making it seem that the person whose eyes they were had never known a day of happiness, joy, or celebration; that sorrow, insanity, and regret had swallowed whatever was left of his soul, condemning him to exist forever in the emptiness.

"My condition is satisfactory," Heero repeated warily, his fingers twitching on the safety of his gun, forever unable to relax. "That's good," the Professor replied warmly, attempting to forget the hard gaze of his eyes. "Do you have any questions?"

Silence. "You don't need to be afraid," Ororo said kindly. "You can tell us anything; we won't betray your trust." The air in the room seemed to chill as they glared in unison.

Heero nearly burst out in hysterical, morbid laughter at the woman's naïve statement. Trust was nothing, a façade. Trust had catapulted him into a living nightmare. Trust was a goddamned lie wrapped in silk.

"I have a question," Duo said brazenly. "Just where in the _hell_ do you get off, telling us that we can trust you? We don't even fucking _know_ you!" Logan bristled at the insult, a low growl rumbling in his chest.

The Professor stared at them with sorrowful eyes; how harsh had their lives been, to make them so wary, so mistrustful? Clearing his throat, he said cheerfully, "It's time for us to interview you separately! Wufei, you'll be going with Ororo. Trowa, you'll be going with Hank, Quatre with Jean, Duo with Scott, and Heero with Logan."

The new mutants stared at the ones chosen to interview them with dead eyes.

The staff, who had seen Apocalypse, who had fought things that would send a normal person screaming in terror, stared back at the boys from the future, and shivered.


	4. Interrogation

Wufei followed the dark-skinned woman in front of him silently, eyes flickering about the hallways with the intensity of a hunted animal. Several teenagers, catching sight of him prowling the hall, disappeared back into their rooms with their tails between their legs. The woman- Ororo, he thought her name was- walked briskly, opening a door and going into a small office.

He looked about covertly; plants were scattered everywhere, the walls sparsely furnished, a dark wooden desk against the far wall. The Oriental youth nodded; he approved of the room. Ororo pulled a chair out for him, taking a seat at her desk and grabbing a pad of paper, holding her fountain pen elegantly poised over the paper.

"This is just a series of questions," she offered, "to let us get your basic information into our computer systems. Are you ready to begin?" The unnerving young man in front of her gave her a regal nod, sitting ramrod straight in the stiff-backed chair.

"Name?"

"Chang Wufei. However, as befits my culture, I would highly prefer to be called simply Wufei."

Ororo noted that in flowing calligraphy, continuing her questioning.

"Date of birth and hometown?"

"December 4, 1987." The former pilot congratulated himself on that; it had been an infernal job thinking up the correct year in the Before Colony system.

"I was born in Beijing, China."

"Relatives?"

_Flames engulf a metal sphere, tilting wildly off its axis, the black fog of death creeping across silver metal. Gleaming hair, stained by blood, crimson life running from his wife's mortal wound to coat his hands as he holds her gently to his chest-_

"They are all deceased."

Ororo glanced up; while he was not the first orphan they had ever had in the Institute, he was the only one she had seen whose relatives, distant or no, were all dead.

"What is your power?"

Wufei stared at her, the obsidian eyes calculating and unsettling. "I do not know."

She set down her pad for a moment, eyebrow raised as she thought over the options.

"We'll test you, then. Many mutants' powers activate under stress. Do your friends know their powers?"

"No."

"Alright, you may leave. If you have any questions, come to me."

The boy stood gracefully and bowed, leaving the room and shutting the door with a soft click.

**Professor?**

**Yes?** Quickly she relayed the information, knowing that Charles would tell the others to leave the question about the new mutants' mutations off the list.

* * *

"Name?" Jean studied the angelic blonde in front of her, sorely tempted to reach out to his mind and see what was inside. Quatre contemplated her as well, blue eyes intent and guileless. 

"I am Quatre Raberba Winner."

"Date of birth and origin?"

"The twentieth of November, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia."

Jean wrote that down in her neat cursive script, glancing back up with a professional air about her. She had never enjoyed doing interviews, but the Professor told her to, and what he said was law.

"Relations?"

Quatre stiffened imperceptibly, an insane whisper creeping out from the dark recesses of his mind.

_Crackling voice, space dark and welcoming around him, insane rage coursing through him, white light- or was it black? - filling his vision- whiteblack space around him, thousands upon thousand of gigabytes of information filling his mind, green zeroes and ones flashing before his eyes. A red scythe cleaves the darkness, death has come._

"They're all dead."

Jean's eyes narrowed. Cautiously she extended a psychic tendril to the younger man before her-

Only to be violently rebuffed by dark power, entwining through her own and forcing her back into her body, having caught not a glimpse of the other's mind. But- it wasn't his power. And if it wasn't his power, then where was it from?

Quatre stood, bidding the older woman a polite goodbye as he left the room. Wufei came around the corner, nodding to him as they met and began to walk back to their room.

* * *

"Name, please?"

_"What is your name?"_

_"I have none."_

_"Everyone has a name, silly! I'm Midii Une, who are you?"_

"Trowa Barton."

Hank wrote it down, looking over the mutant in front of him. He was tall, and had obviously been very well-muscled at one time, but now he swam in his own clothing. The bones of his shoulders showed sharply through the forest green of his turtleneck, his shocking emerald eyes sunken in the fine-boned face. Classic symptoms of malnutrition or starvation. He would have to make sure the boy ate well, then.

"Date and location of birth?"

Trowa studied the odd beast in front of him impartially, face impassive. Blue fur, amber eyes, white lab coat- it made an incredibly odd picture.

"July 20, 1987, Greece."

"Your family?"

Trowa felt a distant pang of sorrow, as familiar to him as the beating of his heart, twinge in his gut.

_The crimson fire roars into the sky, twisting, turning, coiling like a deadly serpent into a sky the color of tarnished gold. Feet crunch on the rubble, the eyes of his 'family' dead, gaunt, lifelessly staring in mordant accusation. He kneels before the tent of the Commandant, the commandant himself impaled upon the ridgepole of his tent, dark head thrown back to stare at the golden sky._

"I never knew them. My adoptive parents are all dead."

"I'm sorry," Hank offered, feeling incredibly inadequate. Trowa accepted it silently, listening to Hank continue,

"I can't help but notice that you're underweight. If you'll come in sometime soon, I'll weigh you and figure out a diet plan for you to gain some of that weight back."

Trowa murmured a thank you, standing at the obvious dismissal and making his way to the door, disappearing through it with alarming silence.

* * *

Duo lounged indolently in one of the room's armchairs, an irritating smirk on his lips as his hands toyed idly with the end of his braid. Scott stared back at him inquisitively, his eyes dark under the crimson quartz of the visor.

"What's your name?"

"I'm the friggin' Pied Piper! Didn't we already go over this before? I tol' ya, my name's Duo Maxwell. I run, I hide, but I never lie."

Scott resisted the urge to groan and rub his temples; he knew this one would be a troublemaker, and quite a good one, if the signs were any indication.

"Your date of birth and origin?"

"The fifth of February, 1988, in New York City." Duo had been to the Big Apple once; he had loved it immensely, finding the people, the atmosphere, the high-octane pace of life to be absolutely exhilarating. Silently he promised himself that he would go visit New York at least once while they were here.

"Any relations?"

_A silver cross is clutched in the hand of a man, the pristine white of his priest's collar stained crimson with his lifeblood, gushing from the raw, open wound of his neck. Booted feet crunch upon the rubble as he sprints to the side of the priest. The man is sprawled across the marble altar, his gray eyes fixed firmly to the crucifix above him, dying with complete and utter devotion. His chest, torn to shreds, the glistening bone white of the spine and ribcage the only bright thing in the room, the lung a charred black mass. The boy bends to take the cross from the stiff hand, affixing it about his neck. The genesis of Shinigami._

"They're all gone." Scott raised his eyes suspiciously for a moment before he set the pen down and asked firmly,

"Why did you insult Storm like that?" The other man's grin darkened, became feral, and for a moment Scott was uncomfortably reminded of the gun that was hidden somewhere on the younger man's form.

"She said we could trust you people," Duo said abruptly, his voice low and serious. "I don't think you understand what the five of us are like."

"You're mutants. Besides, I doubt whatever neurosis you may have is much worse then anybody else's."

In a heartbeat Duo was across the room, one slim, long-fingered hand clamped about Scott's neck, his feminine face in Scott's, violet eyes glowing with an internal rage that howled to be loosed upon the world.

"We trust _nobody._ Fuckin' _nobody_, do you understand? I've lived with Q-ball, Wuffers, Tro, and Heero for three _years_, and you know what? There is nothing in the world that will persuade me to trust them with _anything. _We live together, we fight together, we love each other, but nothing, and I mean _nothing,_ will make us trust each other."

Scott nodded his comprehension feebly, gasping as Duo released him, the other male's mobile face moving into a deceptively innocent grin, calling as he strode out the door, "If that's all the questions, I think I'll be going now. See ya, ass-crack!"

* * *

Logan studied the slim boy before him intently, his nose twitching at the scents that rolled off of the newcomer. Sweat, blood, metal. The acrid smell of pain was not there; odd, considering that both his wrists were slashed to the bone. The kid was thin, painfully so; darkly blank eyes were sunken into a hollow face, brunette hair, messy and short, falling over his eyes. The gun- a Glock- was held carefully in one hand, handled with the sharp ease of a professional. The blue eyes, dark as space, stared back at him in return, the owner's face a neutral mask.

Heero looked at the man before him quietly; the room they were in was sparsely decorated, with several tatami mats covering the floor and an old Macintosh Computer (surprisingly that company still existed in his time) sat whirring quietly on the desk. There was a door six feet to his left, a window five feet in front of him. Had he a choice, he would have sat facing the doorway; it would have made it easier to effect a quick efficient escape.

"What's your name, kid?"

Heero was rattled for a moment, although he showed none of his confusion. He did not have a name. He had codenames. Janus, Odin, Orion, Apollo, Heero… But he did not have a name he could call his own.

"I do not have one, but you may call me Heero Yuy." What a grand example of irony, he thought sourly, that the one who bore the great pacifist's name was the one who destroyed all he stood for.

Logan raised an eyebrow; even street kids chose a name for themselves or were given one. Why wasn't the mutant in front of him protesting the unflattering use of the name 'kid?' All the mutants he called that protested as a matter of course.

"When an' where were you born?"

"Unknown factors," Heero shrugged. Logan twitched at the usage of military jargon; was the kid some sort of soldier? Regardless, he would be running some information checks on him and his friends and calling in a few old favors. Chuck had told him privately that the telepath was unable to see inside the new mutant's minds; some dark energy was blocking him. This information only made Logan more wary, which was fine, considering the other man seemed about as likely to trust him as pigs were to fly.

"Any family?"

"_I found your mother in a prison cell. She was already insane when I got there; no matter, though. All I wanted was you. And there you were, being rocked and sung to."_

"_What was she singing, Doctor?"_

"_It's been a long time. Let me see..._

_Ah, here it is._

'_Rock-a-bye baby,_

_Safe under the ground, _

_With the demons and the ghosties_

_That hunt without sound.' Just that verse, over and over. Your father- we never found him. Odin never knew who he was either."_

"_I see. Thank you, Doctor J."_

"Unknown factors." Logan wrote it down in his crabbed, scrawling handwriting, looking back up and focusing on the tense form before him with amber-brown eyes.

"Ya' have a healing factor, right?"

_Needles threading under skin- oh god the bright light of painpainpain- back arches screaming as acid- so light green like the hue of a new leaf- flows into his body- dimly hearing the bubble and sizzle of bones being eaten, red pain clouds his vision as he shakes wildly, clawing at his own skin and opening bleeding gashes- _

"_Stop the test. Healing factor has been successfully implemented."_

_And he is carried to his cot to die and be reborn._

"Yes."

"Were you born with it?"

_No._

"Yes."

"I have one too." Blue eyes focused on him with the intensity of a laser beam, the corner of one lip quirking in a tiny smile.

"I see," Heero said softly. Logan read over the information one more time before he looked back up, saying,

"You can go now."

Heero bowed and left the room, the gun, as ever, clutched in one hand.


	5. Danger Room

"Duo, Trowa, Quatre, Wufei." The words were soft, and yet cut through the air like a knife, bringing the other pilots to the speaker's side. Heero looked up from Kitty's computer, which he had stolen and quickly modified in order to complete his objective.

"I've finished procuring some of Xavier's money and funneling it into accounts in Zurich." Duo hung over the edge of the chair, his braid falling into Heero's lap as he leaned forward, squinting at the information onscreen. The other pilots crowded around the desk, looking over the numbers on the screen with the shrewd cunning of entrepreneurs.

"Apparently Xavier gets a large monthly stipend from the government for taking these 'mutants' out of the public view. I've diverted twenty percent of that into our accounts. There is one shared between all of us, as well as private ones. Quatre-" the blonde looked up quickly, gesturing for Heero to continue- "-I've found one of your ancestors; they already have a sizable fortune. I believe his name is Bill Gates. I've stolen funds from him as well; small enough to not be noticed, and if in the unlikely event that it is, my path is untraceable."

"The communal account has five-hundred thousand dollars, with an addition each month of the same amount. Each of our private accounts has twenty-thousand dollars. I've made counterfeit credit cards for each of you; you'd be surprised at how primitive their anti-counterfeit technology is here." Heero turned to look at each of them, smiling a sad, small smile. "A small amount of money has been earmarked for you to feed your addictions. Duo, your alcohol is funded. I opened up a small tab for you at a liquor store in the town; Bayville, I believe it is called. Trowa, your LSD is provided for as well. I trust each of you have verified that you have immunity to the harmful affects of your chosen drugs?" The pilots nodded perfunctorily, waiting for him to continue.

"Quatre, your tranquilizer pills are paid for; you can pick up your monthly supply at the same drugstore Duo's alcohol is at. Wufei, your heroin is funded." Wufei looked up quietly to meet Heero's eyes, surprised at the rare expression in them. There was no surprise, no disappointment, no condescension, nothing but calm acceptance of their individual coping strategies. The former Wing pilot's lips pulled into a wry, slight smile.

"As for myself, I've developed more then a passing addiction to menthol cigarettes. Is the amount of money in your accounts agreeable?"

Duo whooped loudly and swooped down to slide an arm around Heero's slender shoulders. Heero tensed, his hand going for his gun, before he realized that it was Duo, not an enemy, and he relaxed and accepted the embrace resignedly.

"It's more then 'agreeable,' Heero! It's great, actually! Thank you!" Duo chattered, squeezing Heero energetically. Trowa smiled, the skin around his eyes crinkling in amusement; Quatre grasped Heero's hand happily; and Wufei, always dignified, bowed gravely.

The noise of thundering footsteps made them whip around, guns drawn. Kitty's shrill voice echoed down the hallway as she shrieked loudly,

"Guys! My laptop is missing! Come help me find it! GUYS!" Duo smiled slyly, picking up the laptop and sliding over to the window. "I'll go return it," he offered, unlatching the window and leaping nimbly to the ground below.

* * *

"Chuck, we need to get them _out_ of here!" Charles Xavier watched Logan pace calmly, one eyebrow raised. He knew who Logan was referring to, of course; how could he not? Logan had been noticeably frustrated with the fact that none of his contacts knew anything about the new mutants.

"I mean, it's like they just dropped in from the sky!" Charles leaned back in his wheelchair and said wearily,

"And why, pray tell, do we need to make them leave?" Logan snorted, irritated at the younger man's blindness, and turned, shoulders hunched in anger.

"You haven't seen them. The way they move; it's like they think they're in a war zone, and there's an enemy around every corner. They handle their guns, their swords, their knives, like professionals, like they've been trained to kill. The way they speak is military; the terseness, the clipped accents." He stomped forward, hobnailed boots clicking on the wooden floor, and slapped his palms down on the desk, staring intensely at the Professor.

"Jesus Christ, Chuck, that Trowa kid nearly _slaughtered_ Kurt when he teleported into the living room! In the library, when Scott was showing the younger kids a film about the Friends of Humanity, one of the people on screen fired off a gun. I heard that Duo nearly had a heart-attack! He leaped up on top of one of the bookcases, pulled out three knives, each one between two knuckles, and threw them at the speaker that the sound had come from. Needless to say, we've got to buy a new one. Wufei has been frightening all the students, ever since the Porcupine challenged him to a duel and Wufei disarmed him in less then ten seconds. All the older students are terrified of Quatre; one of the oldest students tried to beat him up. Quatre's eyes apparently turned an odd silver color and he began laughing. Then he knocked out the bully and made it look easy. And now the younger kids worship him.

That Heero kid- No one ever sees him, you know? He stays in their room, never leaves except in the middle of the night, and his friends bring him food. And Chuck?"

The Professor looked up, waving him to continue. Logan did so, his voice grave.

"I've seen soldiers come home from war with legs and arms blown off; I've seen people who've lost their entire families to war or hunger or disease; I've seen children killed for being mutants. I'd like to think I've seen the worst of humanity, Chuck, but I've never seen eyes that are as cold and dead as Heero's."

* * *

The five pilots followed Scott down the halls of the Institute's basement, heading for the Danger Room. Trowa was bearing the backpack containing their collection of weaponry. Scott was speaking in a pompous, loud voice, 'briefing' them on the Danger Room.

"The Danger Room is where we train. It has eight levels; eight is easiest, one is the hardest. You may face a variety of opponents; holographic assassins, robots, tentacles armed with saws and tazers. Each level has rules. In level one, you must not kill any of the holographic assassins. In level two, you may not kill anyone, but you may remove their legs or arms. From level three onwards, you may kill anyone. Each level lasts about five minutes. Your uniforms will be in the room to the left of the entrance."

* * *

Duo held up his uniform in disgust. "Aw, _hell_ no! I'm not wearing this!" They all looked exactly alike; all were black spandex, all had a red symbol with a black 'X' in the center. Quatre and Wufei were making muffled noises of disapproval as well, scrutinizing the spandex angrily. Trowa and Heero were already dressing, Trowa rolling his eyes at the other's complaining.

"Duo, the faster you get in the thing, the faster you can get out of it," Heero reasoned logically. Duo glared at him for a moment before he grunted and began to struggle into it, Wufei and Quatre following his lead.

Kitty poked her head in, eyes widening and bile rising in her throat. The new mutants looked positively skeletal! The sharps planes and angles of their hips, ribs, and collarbones poked out from underneath the cloth, bones seeming to push restlessly against the black cloth as though yearning to break free. And with as thin and fragile as they seemed- maybe she should warn the Professor? Duo brushed by her ill-temperedly, his braid flicking in the air behind him. The other four followed, Quatre smiling at her apologetically.

* * *

Logan glared down at the featureless metal room; more specifically, the small cluster of people down there. When the new mutants had stridden into the room, everyone in the observation deck had gasped audibly. Not just at their skeletal frames, but at their formidable armory of weapons strapped to their bodies.

Heero had knives strapped around his legs, in his boots, around his upper arms, and a sword; a katana, if Logan judged correctly, sheathed diagonally across his back. His gun, obviously well-used and well-loved, was holstered; several leather pouches of bullets were strung around the belt he wore.

Duo seemed to have gone for the more close-combat route. Knives, knives, knives ranged about his body. Every square inch of his frame, excluding his head and braid, was covered with knives. Two spring-loaded sheaths were attached to the bottoms of his wrists; a leather bandolier strung across his chest; several vials were kept securely in the small pockets, each filled with some unidentifiable substance. Poison, probably.

Trowa was more minimalist in his approach; he had a gun and two bands of complexly woven material around his wrists. Needles gleamed in the dim light, secreted away in the bracelets. What their purpose was, Logan did not know, but he had updated the simulator to include those as possible weapons.

Quatre seemed to be primarily a long-range combatant. Throwing knives were strung across his chest; several small metal javelins, barely two feet long, were held in a quiver on his hip. A gun rested in a shoulder holster, the enameled grip glinting in the light.

Wufei was probably the most lightly armed; he had his sword and a gun, nothing else. Only two weapons.

Still- each one of them was a walking arsenal.

"A'right," he barked into the microphone, "Beginning the simulation."

Light shimmered in the air around them before it coalesced into a mountainous area, with deep, craggy canyons that ripped the jagged earth in two. Black shadows began to move, forming into stealthy assailants.

Slowly, the enemy moved towards the waiting mutants.

The five pilots shared a glance, almost amused, before they began to sign quickly to each other.

Two of us should pair up; the other three will be a group.)

(04- I'm a long-range combatant primarily; so it's a tossup for me between Duo, Wufei, or Heero.)

(03- I'll go with Quatre and Wufei. Is that alright with you, 01, 02?)

(02- Yeah, sure! Come on, Heero! It's killin' time!)

The mutants on the control deck stared, befuddled, at the calm communication between them, while the enemy crept up on their backs.

"What are they doing?" Scott muttered to himself, only to have his eyes fly wide

open as the new mutants exploded into frantic, nearly-choreographed action.

Heero and Duo bounded away from the other three, the long-haired man moving silently, swiftly, as Heero feinted to the right, drawing the opponents off. The five attackers followed him for a moment, their soulless gray eyes blank beneath the cloth of their masks.

One of the five attackers plunged forward, the others moving around in a pincer movement to trap Heero and Duo- In an odd, almost lazy manner, Heero crouched and rested his weight on one hand, his legs sweeping out and knocking the opponent to the ground. One thin hand came back, clenched, white-knuckle tight, into a fist- Heero began battering the prone attacker, who struggled feebly to escape. Seeming to grow bored with the struggling, Heero drew back a knee and rammed it into the opponent's solar plexus, driving the air from him and knocking the attacker unconscious. He shimmered for a moment, and then disappeared.

The other four were having trouble with Duo. Like a snake, he slipped easily through their hands, a wild, vicious grin firmly affixed to his heart-shaped face. One of the opponent's hands swung forward in a wild jab; Duo dodged it by a hair, his hand coming up to entrap the opponent's arm and pull him forward. It was an odd parody of an embrace, the attacker disappearing as soon as Duo's other hand grasped one of the nerves in his neck and squeezed hard, leaving the opponent unconscious. Heero suddenly appeared by him, and with astonishing speed, they disposed of the other three assailants.

Wufei plunged forward with a snarl, grasping one of the shadowy figure's arms and pulling it behind his back, whereupon Trowa slammed his hand into the attacker's jaw, snapping his head back and knocking him out.

Quatre back-flipped nimbly, digging his fingers into the cracks in the side of the canyon and hauling one of the enemies with him. The 'man' choked feebly, his blank gray eyes rolling back into his head. Quatre dropped him with a muttered oath, and leapt back into battle.

Trowa bent down on one knee as Wufei sprinted forward. As soon as the other pilot planted a foot on his spine, he heaved upwards, sending Wufei into freefall. Wufei landed on another assailant, scooping up a rock from the canyon wall and braining him with it.

Quatre and Trowa looked around for Heero and Duo, smiling ferally as the other two joined them. The five pilots moved back-to-back, and then resumed their deadly playtime.

"Level Eight," Logan said, voice carefully inflectionless. "You can kill 'em, use all yer weapons. Begin."

A hiss of air heralded the unsheathing of Heero's sword. The blade glinted in the light as he swung it through the air carefully before letting the blade rest on the ground. The five mutants looked at each other with dark, untamed grins, and there was a deadly, insane light in their varicolored eyes. "Two for each of us," Duo muttered softly.

Ten men stood, lined up like toy soldiers, across the room from them. There were no pretty illusions this time, nothing but cold metal and gleaming holographic blood.

Wufei broke away from the group, withdrawing his gun and firing two bullets. One of the attackers flailed in agony, fragments of bone, tissue, and skin flying out from the gaping, dark wound of his chest. The other howled in rage and sprinted forward, withdrawing a sword and lowering it to point directly at Wufei's torso. The Oriental, seeming bored, pulled his sword out and shifted his stance.

The attacker reached him and slashed sideways, spinning with the force of the blow and thrusting it forward. Wufei was already gone, the blade hissing as he drove it forward. The clang of metal on metal rang loudly in the air, the blades locking and sliding across each other. Wufei pulled back his hand and smashed it into the opponent's nose, driving the bone into the brain and killing him. Just to make sure, he sliced the assailant's throat easily, standing back as red arterial blood poured onto the ground. The body shimmered, and then disappeared as Wufei sheathed his sword and leaned against the wall, waiting for the others to finish their matches.

Quatre pulled out one of his short javelins and pressed a button. With a whoosh of air, it extended into a long spear that gleamed in the light. The Arabian smiled darkly and bent backwards, snapping his body forward and hurling the spear. It took the dark ninja through the throat, tearing the flesh apart and lodging in the space between the axial vertebrae. The spear clattered to the floor as the ninja screamed in agony, arching his back and vanishing.

Drawing his gun, Quatre twirled it idly around his fingers, aiming quickly and firing. The shot took the opponent cleanly through the heart, killing him instantly. Finished with his short duel, he holstered his weapons, picked up the javelin, and strode over to rest by Wufei.

Trowa stared coolly, amused, at the ninjas as they rushed towards him. Drawing back his left wrist, he removed several needles from the bracelet, holding them thoughtfully in his fingers. The needles were poisoned, and could kill within a minute, depending on where they were placed. In this case, speed seemed to be of the essence. One of the ninjas leaped into the air, aiming a foot at Trowa's upturned face. With a flick of the wrist, the five needles rocketed towards the opponent, each embedding itself around the ninja's heart. Blank gray eyes flew open in agonizing pain, and the ninja fell slowly, crumpling to the floor.

Dodging the other assailant easily, he fired three bullets, each piercing a vital organ. One the heart, one the spleen, and the other the stomach. If he missed the heart, the wounds to the stomach and spleen would kill the opponent anyway. The man gurgled softly, gloved hand coming up to touch the cloth, wet with blood, before he, too, vanished.

Duo howled with mad laughter as he leaped nimbly out of the way, slashing the attacker's throat. Dark crimson blood sprayed from the torn arteries, coating the walls and floor. Duo grinned at the dying ninja, flipping his knife in his hand casually. "Never play with Shinigami," he whispered to the man, "For he does not play fair." The blood and the man disappeared, leaving the space empty.

With a bored smirk, he rammed the dagger behind him, tearing it downwards. The man screamed in pain, his hands coming up to try and push his organs back into his body futilely. Duo withdrew the blade and stared at it in disgust, wiping it on the Spandex and sheathing it as he strolled over to wait by the other three.

Heero whirled the katana and crouched, his blue eyes blank and cold as he stared at the onrushing assailants. How.. easy. His lip curled in disdain as he stood up and sheathed the sword. If they weren't going to give him a worthy opponent, then he wasn't going to use any weapons. His fingers curled into claws, the blunt nails no hindrance. One foot lifted, set back on the ground again, and he launched himself forward.

With a swipe of his hand, he tore out the belly of one, feeling the alarmingly real slick slide of holographic blood over his fingers. With the other hand, he hooked his thumb into the hollow of the artery, and tore savagely. Blood sprayed, and the last opponent fell silently to the ground.

With a blank look on his face, he slid over to stand by the rest of the pilots.

The entire massacre (it was too one-sided to call a battle) had taken less than a minute.

"Jesus Christ.." Scott whispered in awe, he and the other students clustered by the windows and staring at the five bored-looking mutants below. Logan and the Professor were conversing in low, worried tones, their expressions grave. Evan growled in frustration and envy, slamming a fist down onto one of the consoles. A low, calm voice said softly,

"Saw Tentacle: Activated. Target: Quatre Winner."

An agonized scream split the silence.

Quatre's back was arched painfully, eyes wide in betrayal, his pale hands clutching the ruthlessly whirring saw that protruded from his shoulder. Red blood flew from the saw blade, flecking the silent bystanders that stood for a moment, staring.

Crimson rage flickered in their eyes.

Golden fur was sprouting like grass from Trowa's skin, washing down his back and shoulders as a rainfall might. The clothes were being absorbed, somehow, into his body- Pain slashed its way down his synapses, the legs, arms, jaw structure reconfiguring, but he didn't feel it-

They hurt Quatre. They hurt him- tea-drinking, gently violent Quatre-

They deserved to _die_!

A full-throated roar rang from the walls as the massive golden lion with startling emerald eyes left the ground, his claws tearing huge gouges in the ground as he leaped to land atop the tentacle, gleaming white fangs deadly, clawing furiously at the smooth metal, ripping great chunks of metal and wiring.

But the tentacle kept on.

Flame burst into being, white-hot and snarling, consuming the air around itself to fuel the fury. Wufei shook silently, his hands outstretched, lips and teeth pulled back in a savage grin. The fire flew forward, destroying air and oxygen, to surround the metal monstrosity that had dared to hurt one of their master's own. The sizzle of burning metal and cracking wires filled the air, mingling with Quatre's agonized screams and Trowa's feral roars.

But the tentacle didn't stop.

Duo's eyes flew wide open as Quatre's blood flecked his face. Wonderingly, he raised a hand to touch it. Violet eyes darkened-

Wings of shadow spread from his shoulders; insubstantial, seeming to be made of smoke and darkness. A red light gleamed in Duo's eyes as he growled low in his throat. Shadow seemed to engulf the room, crawling together to meld into one whole, a towering column of darkness that waited by Duo, ready for his command. The shadow flew forward and wrapped itself around Quatre, gently pulling him from the tentacle. Red blood was contained inside the bandages of darkness, the Arabian's eyes unfocused and glassy as Duo knelt, beginning to tear strips of cloth and bandage the gaping wound.

But the tentacle did not cease it's howls.

Heero turned his head to stare at the weapon that remained static, the whirring of the saw blade ringing off the metal walls. His face did not change; his eyes did not widen; he showed no reaction to the attack on Quatre. And somehow-

That was the most frightening of all.

Slowly he raised a hand to point at the defilement of technology. Heero blinked for a moment; there seemed to be a white-hot ball of light inside the thing, the glow rapidly ebbing. He turned to the others, seeing that they, too, had these white balls of light inside them, stronger then the ones that were inside the control room above them.

Light, life- His hand curled into a fist and the white light inside the tentacle was gone, destroyed, as if it had never been. The tentacle crashed to the ground with a deafening sound, the 'life-force,' such as it was, extinguished by Heero's power.

The lion padded over to Quatre's pale, blood-spattered form, changing fluidly on its way into the tall, silent European. Heero loped over and knelt, looking up to see Duo, normal once more, busily bandaging the open flesh. Wufei blinked, the flames gone, and sprinted over, still managing to be dignified.

"I've got the bleeding under control," Duo said tersely. "Prognosis is good- it should heal in about a week, less if Heero donates some of his blood." Heero nodded in response, watching Trowa pick Quatre up and cradle him gently against his chest. The five of them left the Danger Room together, refusing to acknowledge the observers.

Logan was the first to break the silence.

"Well, holy shit."


	6. Conversations

_"Rock-a-bye baby, safe under the ground-"_

_Stop. Rewind. Repeat._

_The woman's dark hair gleamed on the screen, the bundle of squirming cloth in her arms gently rocked as she sang._

_"-with the demons and the ghosties that hunt without sound."_

_Stop. Rewind. Repeat._

_The old man enters the cell softly, cybernetic arm clicking and whirring. He can hear it on the speakers. A man with long blonde hair stands beside the older man, a gun cradled restlessly in his hands. Lips, blue with cold, part, and a soft voice asks, "Odin?" The watcher is confused, his hands, shackled together, rattling on the arms of the chair._

_The baby is removed from the hands of the woman, who continues to rock and sing just the same. The doctor stares with pitiless gray eyes at the insane prisoner, and nods to Odin. The massive man takes a step forward, places the gun against her head, and fires. Gray matter explodes onto the walls and floor, painting the room with crimson._

_The baby does not cry. Blue eyes, token of a father never known, stare at the corpse with unnerving intelligence. At the age of three hours old, the child has been admitted into the small league of those who see their mothers die. _

_There are no tears. No screams. No emotion. The two, now three, leave the room, and the baby is silent._

_The tattered blue blanket falls to the floor with a rustle. _

"Heero! Heero, wake up!"

He woke from dreaming with a crash, meeting Duo's red-rimmed eyes and feverishly slurred words.

There was whisky on Duo's breath.

Dark eyes moved to stare at the others. Trowa was sprawled across the end of his bed, a vapid, mad smile scrawled across his lips, caught in the drugged stupor of LSD. It was a useful coping mechanism, he knew; after much experimentation, Trowa learned to control the visions he had while high, somewhat.

Quatre was deeply asleep, his small, lithe form, shoulder bandaged tightly, sprawled across Trowa, one slim hand fisted in Trowa's shirt. A box of tranquilizer pills, nearly empty, rested on the bureau, illuminated by the faint light of the moon. Quatre was lucky in his choice of poison; the pills allowed him peaceful rest and an escape from the constant foreign emotion his Space Heart cursed him with.

The last member of their mismatched family was on the other side of the bed; they had pushed together the three beds when they first arrived in order to make one large one for them all to sleep in. Wufei was curled in a fetal position, a slight smile tugging at his lips, his breathing unnaturally slow and raspy. Heroin was something that even Gundam pilots are not immune to.

"Yoush m' bes' friend!" Duo slurred, plunking down beside him and flinging an arm around slim, scarred shoulders. Heero stared up into glazed violet eyes calmly and said,

"I am flattered. Now go to sleep." Duo pouted childishly, the empty bottle of Jack Daniels on the nightstand gleaming in the light. "Yer no fun," the braided man chided, snuggling up to Heero and closing his eyes. Trowa laughed suddenly, an unnerving, high-pitched sound.

Heero stared into the darkness of the night, surrounded by drug addicts who were also his best friends, closed his eyes, and slipped away.

* * *

"I'm telling ya, Chuck, those kids are dangerous!" Logan paced the soft blue carpet of Charles' office, the bald man watching him with a weary, paternal expression. Logan spun, irritated, continuing, "They slaughtered the opponents in the simulation. Heero tore out one's throat and the other's belly. Duo was whispering at the end; he said, 'Shinigami does not play fair.' 'Shinigami' means 'God of Death.' Even that nice one, Quatre, he threw a spear into one without blinking an eye."

Frustrated, Logan raked his fingers through his dark hair, meeting Charles' eyes. "They're soldiers. I dunno what kind or what training they've had, but they're soldiers." Charles smiled sadly, replying,

"I'm aware of that, Logan. Unfortunately, I'm still unable to see inside their minds." Logan snorted at that, and, bidding a gruff goodbye, left the room. Silently, Charles finished his thought, 'Although I'm not sure I'd want to.'

Logan stopped short in the hallway leading to the attics of the Institute. He slept close to them, since he was prone to nightmares, and could injure a roommate or the person who came to check on him. His nose twitched, a scowl wrinkling his forehead.

The spicy scent of cigarettes, vaguely minty (menthol?) wafted about him, coming from the half-open window to his left.

"Stupid kids," he muttered; if one of them was smoking, that meant they had to have pilfered the cigarettes from his stash. Leaning outside the window, his claws shot out with a 'snickt!' to plunge deeply into the bricks, anchoring him to the wall. Amber-brown eyes narrowed in confusion as he saw nothing, no shoes, no pants, no sign of anyone.

With a grunt, he swung his legs outside the window and jammed the steel-capped toes of his boots into the mortared cracks between the bricks, pulling his arm back and plunging it back into another brick, beginning his slow, laborious ascent up the wall of the Institute.

As he reached the shingled roof, Logan withdrew his claws, before he heaved himself over with a grunt, only to find himself staring down the barrel of a gun, steely-blue eyes focused on him with all the intensity of a laser beam.

Heero.

"You can put the gun away," Logan said, dusting off his worn jeans as he stood, looking around at the admittedly odd scenery.

Heero was sprawled against one of the chimneys, his back painfully straight, legs crooked slightly and crossed at the ankles. Darkly intelligent eyes watched his every move, the younger man's ragged denim jacket rippling in sync with his sienna-brown hair. A lit cigarette rested lazily in the corner of Heero's mouth, the red-glowing tip nearly blending in with the crimson bricks behind him.

"You smoke?" Logan asked rhetorically, moving cautiously over to sit well away from Heero. The older mutant pulled one of his cigars from his pockets and flicked his lighter (a Zippo, emblazoned with a maple leaf) open, lighting the cigar and sticking it in his mouth, beginning to chew contentedly on the tobacco. Heero raised an eyebrow, saying simply,

"Yes." Logan nearly snorted; it certainly seemed that the kid did not have a penchant for idle conversation. A man after his own heart. He was lucky when it came to smoking; his healing factor neutralized all negative effects, as well as making him practically immortal. It must be the same for Heero, then.

"I noticed your tactics in the Danger Room. What school of martial arts did you and the others train in?" Heero's eyes flicked over to stare piercingly at him for a moment, his agile mind quickly considering the ramifications of telling Logan the information. It couldn't truly be used against them, since in this time; there was no OZ, nor ESA. In his short, clipped voice, he spoke softly,

"Wufei is a master in Shokotan. Quatre is a master at aikido. Trowa has mastered jujitsu, Duo ninjitsu." Logan listened carefully, nodding once he comprehended the different styles. A diverse, well-rounded group, indeed. But Heero hadn't said what he was trained in...

"And you?" A cynical snort drifted through the air, Heero removing the cigarette from his mouth and blowing the smoke out idly. The older man waited patiently for an answer, confident he would get one. Heero turned to him, his expression blank.

"All of them, and many more." Logan lifted an eyebrow in surprise, replying, "And why do you have to know all of them, and the others only one each?" Heero shrugged and said in a tone of finality,

"It was required." Logan inhaled deeply, the familiar burn of smoke racing through his lungs, before he retorted,

"What, so someone gives you a requirement, and you fulfill it?" Heero nodded once, sharply, and flicked the ash off the end of his cigarette. Logan replied idly, "Can't be much of a life." Heero turned to him, eyes calculating, measuring his worth. Logan stared back, amber-brown meeting electric blue, two souls crying out in silent, unknown agony reaching for each other, for any kind of kinship or understanding. Thin lines of stress faded for a moment, the hard planes of their faces softened-

And the moment broke, Heero turning away and leaping down onto the ledge of the window, swinging inside the hallways of the Institute once more.

Logan was left only with the fading whisper,

"It isn't a life."

* * *

"Scott..."

"Yeah?" Jean glanced at her boyfriend, green eyes worried. "School starts in a week, and the new mutants are probably going to be going with us."

"So?" Jean, irritated, continued, "So what if they react to the people in the school like they did in the Danger Room? They could very easily kill someone." Ororo entered the room, Rogue and Evan following. The younger members of the X-men looked up from their awed contemplation of Ginsu knives on the television screen, turning to face the older woman. Ororo perched on the arm of the couch, smoothing her skirt out.

"I know that everyone is very excited to be going back to school," she smiled at the loud groans of protest, "But there is an added element of danger this year. As you all know, we have been exposed as mutants to the rest of the world. Prejudice and hazing will likely run rampant. The new mutants- Duo, Trowa, Heero, Wufei, and Quatre- will be going to school with you. Unfortunately, they have shown themselves to be highly dangerous and possibly paranoid, so the hostile environment might affect them badly, leading to extreme violence. Charles and I have decided to partner several of you with one of them, making sure that as little fights as possible happen. We tested all five of them, and all of them are at senior level, but we only have two seniors, so one of them will be partnered with both of you. So…" she pulled out a list; the teenager's eyes followed it immediately, waiting. Ororo read the list out,

"Kurt, you have Trowa. Kitty has Quatre; Rogue, you have Duo; Heero is with Jean, and Wufei is partnered with-"Scott blanched when he realized, "Scott," Ororo finished cheerfully. "Any questions? Yes, Kurt?"

"What if the Brotherhood or the Acolytes attempt to start a fight?" The blue-furred mutant ventured, his tail flicking to emphasize his nervousness. "Jean will keep tabs on everything, right?" The telepath nodded distractedly, her mind consumed with thoughts of how to prevent Heero from destroying the school. Scott's eyes flicked to her beneath his visor; jealousy roiled in his gut: Heero was attractive, if he was any judge, and he had that damnable 'look-at-me-I'm-dark-and-sexy' air about him. He smirked; he was taller then Jean, though, whereas Heero was at least a foot shorter then her. He did have a height advantage, at least.

* * *

"Okay, guys, let's review the plan." Duo sat cross-legged at the head of the bed, dressed in black sweatpants and a ratty t-shirt, appearing nowhere near hung-over. The other pilots had elected him to serve as their leader in the education part of their time here; as an American, and being naturally gregarious, he was in the perfect position to tell them what to do in the unfamiliar environment of a public high school.

"Quatre-"the Arabian looked up with a pained smile: his Space Heart was quickly going into overload from the tidal wave of emotion raging around the Institute. Trowa gripped his uninjured shoulder in a silent show of support, sitting behind the smaller teenager with his free arm wrapped loosely around Quatre's waist.

"You're going to keep watch on all of us using your Space Heart. If one of us starts to experience anger, tell the rest of using some sort of signal, like making our heart rates accelerate briefly. Then the rest of us will show up to support the one in trouble." The former Deathscythe pilot grimaced as he said, "I know that none of us are very happy about being separated, or about this harebrained 'partners' shit. As for the partners-"he flashed a quick smirk at Wufei-"Man, I pity you, 'Fei, getting stuck with that tight-ass Scott. But you like your asses- Mmmphg!"

"Finish that sentence and die, Maxwell," Wufei said, pretending to see nothing at all unusual about his clamping his hand over Duo's mouth. Duo slyly stuck his tongue out and licked Wufei's palm, making the Oriental pull his hand back with a cry of disgust. "Okay, okay," Duo said, holding his hands up in surrender to the reproving glares of Heero and Trowa.

"As for the partners, we're going to stay neutral. Offer no false information unless they ask for it, and say nothing unless they initiate a conversation." '_Not that I'm going to follow those rules to the letter,'_ he thought. Homework will be dealt with as a group, each to their own strengths. Hopefully no one will ask us for help, but if they do, offer it and then retreat. As for our weapons, I was thinking that we should leave-"he looked around the circle, grinning at the stubborn glares sent his way. "Okay, okay, I was just yanking your chain. We can each take one gun, but nothing more. There are no metal detectors so we're safe. Okay, that's the end. Any questions or concerns?"

Heero blinked twice, mentally separating himself from Zero's whispered entreaties and threats before he said,

"Zero is becoming angry. It is demanding more bloodshed, which I refuse to give it. I estimate that soon it will attempt to try to control me. Quatre, have the remnants of Zero in you said anything?" Quatre sighed; although Heero was the one to bear the burden of carrying nearly all of the Zero System in his brain, he still dealt every day with part of Zero. The system, divorced from its world of constant battle and bloodshed, was rapidly growing more demanding, more insistent in its assurances that total annihilation of everyone around them was necessary to keep the five of them from torture and death.

"Yes, Heero, although I'm usually able to control or ignore it. Not like you, I'm afraid," he said. Heero, as master of the Zero System, was privy to all of its thoughts, and as such, he shared his body with the System. At rare intervals, the system was able to take control, and, without the intervention of the other pilots, death tore a swath across the land.

"I've chosen some clothes for all of us that aren't quite as- _conspicuous_ as what we usually wear. We're all going to be in jeans and t-shirts; we want to resemble each other slightly, so that the other students will associate us with each other unconsciously. And yes, Duo, you get to wear your precious black anarchy shirt and your trench coat," Quatre said with a fond glance at the braided teenager. He had the most 'normal' sense of fashion among them, pink shirts notwithstanding, so he was elected to select clothing for them. Duo whooped and disappeared into the bathroom, dragging his bag of clothing with him.

"Look at it this way," Wufei offered. "If we keep him happy, we never have to go on one of those hellish shopping expeditions again."

"True," Trowa said. Quatre reached up and lightly hit his lover on the side of his head, grinning. "Come on, I like to shop." Trowa rolled his eyes in mock-despair, focusing when Heero coughed in impatience. "Heero, you've got your denim jacket and your tennis shoes- not the horrid yellow ones, please- and your shirts. Please choose something from the white to gray range- we do want to appear as generic as possible. Wufei, the white shirt and your beloved Doc Martens should do fine." Wufei hmphed; it wasn't _his_ fault that he wanted to wear shoes with thick soles so that he could bash someone's chest in if needed. "Trowa, the green shirt- no, not the turtleneck, love- will do well."

Duo entered the room again, doing a twirl to show off his outfit. Quatre sighed and said, "Duo, when I said you could wear your trench coat, I did _not_ mean the one with the handmade burning effigy of Scott on the back."


	7. School

"Where you from?" Rogue asked, glancing at Duo out of the corner of her eye as she took a corner, straightening out her crappy little four-door sedan. "New York," Duo answered. "By the way, I don't think we've been properly introduced. I'm Duo Maxwell; I run, I hide, but I never lie!" He extended a hand, waiting for Rogue to shake. Rogue looked at it for a second- '_Not his fault, girl',_ she told herself, '_He doesn't know about your mutation,'_- and steered to the side of the road, picking up her leather gloves and slipping them on. Duo watched the proceedings with his eyebrows raised in polite confusion, his hand still extended. Rogue shook his hand finally, introducing herself, "I'm Rogue. No last name. I'm from Louisiana."

"Louisiana, huh? I've been there, to Baton Rouge," Duo lied, cocking his head at Rogue's hands. "What's the crap with the gloves about? Part of your mutation?" Rogue smirked at Duo's flippant tone, although it was tinged with sadness. Once he found out about her true power, he, like all the others, would leave. Restarting the car, she pulled back into traffic, heading towards the high school.

"My power is directly linked to skin-to-skin contact," she said. "When I touch someone without gloves on, I… I suppose you could say I 'absorb' them. Their personality, powers, and memories all become part of me. The person I touched usually remains unconscious for a day or so, although, in cases of long contact with them, they die. I'm unable to access all of my stored powers, though. The Professor said that to attempt to use them would most likely destroy me from the overload of energy. Sucks to be me, huh?" She flashed an ironic grin at Duo, waiting for him to flinch away.

The former pilot saw beneath the smile, to the lonely and fragile person beneath. 'G always said I was too kind,' he thought, continuing in his internal monologue, 'This chick's _dangerous_, though. I'll tell the guys, then, and we'll make sure to stay at a polite distance. I'd better classify her as a potential enemy. But she's obviously so lonely. I'll stay with her, then. Damnit, Maxwell, collecting strays again, are we?'

Aloud, he said, "No more then it sucks to be someone else."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I mean," Duo said patiently, "That you still have a roof over your head-"

_An explosion lights the night-cycle of the slums of L2, tearing a hole in the thin metal shell of the colony. The child with violet eyes wails in terror as the airless void is exposed, and the horrible, long suck of oxygen leaving begins. His best friend, Maria, is lifted from the ground by the force, and flung into the lightless, airless void. He keeps his eyes on her, long after her swollen tongue protrudes from her lips, her face bloated and blue, the shattered lenses of her glasses whirling in an ethereal dance about the ugly spectacle. The child with violet eyes learns, then, that there is beauty in death._

"-plenty of food to eat-"

_A child cries, a thin, piping keen that makes the hair on the passerby's neck stand up. An outstretched, begging hand; wide, beseeching violet eyes immediately gluing themselves onto anyone that looked like they might have money to spare for a small runt of a beggar, a child with no friends, no family, no home. But all they spare is a glance, at least; a kick and a muttered oath, at best. The child gets up every time, patting his swollen, distended belly. Desperate, he glances about. A lady with a grocery bag! He grabs it and runs. The child with violet eyes learns, then, that there is no one who cares for the orphaned and lost, and that he will do whatever he must to survive. _

"-and medical care. Much better to have that, at the price of touch, then to be an orphan in Somalia or some godforsaken place like that and not have any of that." Rogue looked at him out of the corner of her eyes; there had been a sadness and finality in his voice, as if he had lived without all of those things for a long time. As if he knew of what he spoke of.

"I guess," she said, unconvinced. "Here we are; the hellish institution known as Bayville High School." Duo vaulted from the car as soon as it came to a stop, dragging his brand-new, black (of course) backpack with him, landing with a click of his combat boots. "Awesome! It's been a while since I've been to school," he said, adding mentally, '_One that I haven't had to blow up, at least.'

* * *

_

"Hey, mutie freak!"

"Oh, look. The freaks got a new member. We're going to teach you a lesson, you freak!"

Kurt Wagner, better known as Nightcrawler, snuck a glance at the tall, silent figure walking beside him. Trowa hadn't done a thing when Kurt had turned on his holographic cover, besides raise one eyebrow.

But Kurt was quickly learning that with Trowa Barton, the smallest gestures meant the biggest things. Kurt was, to be frank, terrified of the other boy. His first experience with Trowa had been frightening enough on its own; he was hard-pressed not to shiver when he remembered it.

He had 'ported into the living room, and felt an agonizing pain through his chest. In the space of a second, he had reversed the 'port, and ended up sprawled on the end of the couch. A bullet lay embedded in the wall, right where he had 'ported, and Trowa Barton sat coolly in the armchair, his gun pointed calmly at Kurt. The furry mutant had learned the value of never startling Trowa or his compatriots right then.

Trowa was unnerving even now, as he refused to react to the taunts and barbs. Closed, shadowed emerald eyes roved the halls, and Kurt could tell that the green-eyed young man was marking all potential exits with the grace and finesse of a practiced spy.

Kurt stopped at his locker, swinging it open. A picture of Amanda grinned from the inside of the door, sloppily taped. Trowa's eyes shifted to it, the were-lion's lip lifting in the tiniest of smiles.

"Your girlfriend?" Kurt started; that was the first time Trowa had said anything the entire morning!

"Um, yeah. Her name's Amanda." He scooped out several books, dumped them into his backpack, and slammed the locker shut, turning to Trowa. "The next class is Music. I can't play, but it's the only way I can earn my Fine Arts credits without taking dance or art. Your friend Quatre will be there- Oh, and the teacher is virulently anti-mutant, so he'll probably put you two on the spot."

Trowa shrugged once, and they proceeded on.

* * *

Quatre smiled at Kitty, finding her incessant chatter to be a welcome distraction from the pain of his Space Heart.

"-and anyway, then Jubilee was all like, 'No way!' And I said, 'Uh-huh.' So we went over to the window, and there Mr. Logan was, totally frozen in place by Bobby. It was really funny, but then we all had extra Danger Room sessions afterward, so it wasn't that good in retrospect."

Quatre was pleased that it was so easy to keep her off the subject of him: the girl only required a few 'hmms' inserted in the right pauses and she would blabber on endlessly for hours. It was first period, and they were currently sitting in a corner of the music room while the other members of the class glared or rolled up spitballs threateningly.

Trowa sat beside him, arms folded across his chest and head bowed as he whispered softly into his ear. Only the press of thigh to thigh gave any hint as to their true relationship. With their entry into the room beside two known mutants, they had immediately been marked as easy prey by the people sitting around them.

Mr. Forenser, a thin, weedy man with a pencil-thin mustache and slicked-back, oily dark hair, turned away from the whiteboard with a flourish, an ugly smile spreading across his face as he caught sight of the two new students. Tugging on his garish, plaid bowtie, he stepped forward and barked,

"You two! Names!" Quatre looked up and smiled politely, the innocent look glazing the obvious contempt in his eyes. "Quatre Winner and Trowa Barton, _Mr._ Forenser," he answered, putting a slight, sarcastic stress on the man's name. The man colored an unappealing shade of puce and continued, attempting to be intimidating, "And I don't suppose you two-" A pause of silence, filled with ugly, unspoken words. "- are educated in the art of music? Of course not, you're mutants after all." Trowa lifted his head, a dangerous glint in his eyes. Quatre's eyes narrowed as he said in a smooth tone,

"Actually, we are classically trained in the violin and flute."

"Oh, so you won't mind playing some Beethoven, hmm?" Trowa stood, shaking off Kurt's restraining hand, and moved over to the instrument lockers. He opened the first one, ignoring the teacher's glare, and shut it, moving to the second one, immediately choosing the two most expensive instruments, the two that were reserved for Mr. Forenser alone. He handed the violin to Quatre and took up his post behind him, inspecting the flute critically.

Quatre tightened the bow, slicked some rosin on it, and tucked the violin under his chin. "Which one?" Trowa, finished with his inspection, answered, "Beethoven's Ninth." The Arabian smiled, tapped his foot twice, and launched into the soaring, high notes of 'Ode to Joy.' Trowa began to play as well, his eyes half-lidded as his long fingers moved gracefully over the flute, each note perfect and defined, each combining with the violin to become a work of art. Kitty and Kurt smiled at each other in relief, ignoring Mr. Forenser's rapidly building rage.

"Enough!" The two lowered their instruments, the peace that had come to their faces disappearing immediately. "You two have detention for cheating." Kurt glanced helplessly at Trowa, who lifted one shoulder in the slightest of shrugs. Quatre sighed inaudibly as the other members of the class hooted in triumph, pounding their beefy fists on the desks. "You four," the teacher said, pointing at the mutants, "You just sit there in the corner while I teach the _normal_ students how to play. And give me back my instruments!" The two laid the instruments down and slid over to sit next to Kitty and Kurt. All of them winced as the classroom erupted into a cacophony of something that was most assuredly _not_ music, the other students screeching away on their instruments blissfully.

"Ugh…" Quatre muttered.

* * *

"Welcome to Physics," the teacher stuttered, his slumped, rounded shoulders quivering nervously. Scott rolled his eyes and leaned over to whisper into Wufei's ear,

"This guy doesn't care about us being mutants. He's much too involved in his books for that. Just be careful of Duncan," he jerked his head at the muscular football player, who was leering at them threateningly. Wufei twitched; he despised his partner.

Summers had spent the entire two periods before this jabbering away incessantly about Jean, his wonderful girlfriend. Wufei briefly spared a sympathetic thought for Heero, trapped with that _woman_, who, if Scott was any indication, was even worse then her lover.

"W-we w-will b-be studying the e-effects of vacuums on m-moving objects." The man, Mr. Soleda, forced out. Wufei growled under his breath; how _dare_ this man underestimate him? He learned this in the fourth year of schooling!

Duncan reached into the pocket of his letterman jacket, grasping a piece of paper and a straw. The freaks were turned away from him, arguing quietly over Chang's theory, which, frankly, he was too cool to care about. He chewed the paper furiously, tipped the spitball into the straw and raised it to his lips, aiming, waiting a second, and firing.

Wufei spun at the slight noise, catching the spitball and flinging it back at Duncan, who caught it right in the nose.

"OWWWW! Ow-wow-wow!" Duncan tumbled off his seat, blood gushing from his nose. "Damn you, Chang," he groaned, writhing about melodramatically. Scott gaped at Wufei, who had managed to catch one of Duncan's spitballs. He had been beaned enough by Duncan to know that _nobody_ could catch those stupid projectiles.

"Uh-oh…" he murmured as Wufei turned a violent shade of red and rose slowly from his seat, stalking towards Duncan.

"_Imbecile!_ How _dare _you use my given name!" Duncan rolled over and attempted to scramble out the door, and Wufei, with an unsettling laugh, pounced. They rolled across the floor, socking each other in the face. Mr. Soleda squeaked and cowered in the corner, while all of the students leapt to their feet and circled around the combatants, screaming, "FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!"

Wufei heaved Duncan over his head and into the wall, dusting his hands off pompously. "There. I have fought with honor." Marching back over to his seat, he sat and resumed arguing with Scott.

"D-d-detention, Wufei," Mr. Soleda gurgled feebly.

* * *

"Okay, egg-sucking scumwads!" The Physical Education instructor shrieked. Mr. Bonnes ("pronounced like 'bones' 'cause yours are going to be _crushed_!") was a former college football player, enraged by his fall into coaching high school students. As such, he tended to take out all his anger on the 'shrimps,' who couldn't fight back.

Mr. Bonnes also despised mutants, seeing them as aberrations and threats to such God-fearing, 'normal' people as, for example, himself. So, when he saw the new freaks, three of whom were short, two of whom, unfortunately, were taller then him, his day got much, much better. He particularly had a dislike for that foreigner 'Heero Yuy.' The shrimp was being much too condescending. He wasn't even frightened!

"Matt," he whispered, beckoning over one of his favorite players. The thick-skulled running back sniggered cruelly as he whispered his plan into the teenager's ear, sending him off to the locker room with a wink.

* * *

Heero ground his teeth together very slowly. All of his comrades had gotten detentions, which meant that he would have to come up with a plan to get a detention as well. They were the Gundam pilots, and they rose and fell as a team. Wufei got one for fighting, Quatre and Trowa for allegedly 'upstaging' the music teacher, and Duo for calling the literature teacher a 'withered old bitch who wouldn't know good writing if it popped up and socked her in the nose' to her face.

Of course there were PE uniforms, which he was _not_ going to change into in front of others. He had too many scars, both physical and mental, for that. The five pilots huddled together in a corner, talking to each other softly.

"So anyway, Rogue and I skipped first period and hung out in the library. She likes Poe too, actually."

"I prefer Eliot," Trowa said, glancing up as one of the football player's shadows loomed over them. The idiot- Joe, he believed- grinned piggishly and taunted,

"What's the matter, faggots? Too frightened to change clothes in front of us _real_ men?" Scott, in the corner, looked over and then resumed dressing, ignoring the confrontation. The new mutants could handle themselves well enough, if the Danger Room was any indication.

"And you're mutie freaks, too!" Joe said delightedly. "Looks like me and my mates'll have to teach you all a lesson!" Heero stiffened slightly, enough to warn the other pilots. The former Wing pilot had always been the most sensitive about the rapes that the OZ soldiers had often committed. He had always been the only one chosen for that particular punishment, as the OZ soldiers often despised him for killing their comrades, and knew that physical torture wouldn't get results.

"If I were you," Wufei warned, "I wouldn't say another word." Joe's eyes lit up in pleasure, knowing that he had found a sore spot. "Oh, so maybe you fags _like_ being beat up?" Heero's fingers clenched and relaxed, blue eyes staring blindly into shadowed memories.

Duo reached over and wrapped his arm around the shorter boy's shoulders, shepherding him out of the locker room. The others left, glancing at the jocks and silently planning their revenge.

* * *

"Okay! We're going to play dodgeball," Mr. Bonnes shrieked, rubbing his hands together fiendishly. "Kurt, Kitty, Scott, Jean, Quatre, Trowa, Wufei, Duo and Heero, go over there. All the rest of you, come stand near me."

The mutants trooped over to stand forlornly against the wall, facing the line of athletes, who tossed the hard foam balls in their hands threateningly. The mutants were outnumbered by at least five to one. "One, two, three… GO!"

A hail of balls flew full-force towards the mutants. Heero and Quatre, the two shortest pilots, ducked and ran to stand near the center line, their bodies gracefully arching to avoid the balls. The others leaped into the air, catching the balls and throwing four forward to the former Wing and Sandrock pilots, who threw them at the opponents.

WHOMP! The projectiles collided with an explosion of air against Joe and his three comrades, the force such that they lost their balance and fell, arms windmilling wildly, to the floor. Scott shared an impressed glance with Jean, motioning the two younger mutants to stand with them against the wall. It would be interesting to watch the new mutant's tactics, at the very least.

As the balls continued to fly, Wufei caught two more and tossed them into the stockpile at their feet, saying, "You'd think they'd have a better strategy."

"They're bigots, Wuffers! Their average intelligence quotient is about the same as an unusually slow mollusk."

"That's a very good simile, Duo. I'm impressed."

"Don't call me WUFFERS!"

All the while, they continued to toss them to the others, who wound up and fired them at the opponents, who usually fell over with a noise akin to that of a dying giraffe. Mr. Bonnes, standing on the sidelines, puffed up with rage, his beefy visage coloring a vermilion shade.

Finally, the opponents were left with no more ammunition, or people. Matt stood, shivering, in the center of the gym, his eyes glancing furtively back and forth. Heero and Quatre looked at each other, smirked, and fired. The balls hit him in the chest and face, and he toppled, streaming blood, to the floor.

The others, who were sitting against the wall sullenly, bruised and bleeding, leapt to their feet and charged the pilots, rage written large on their faces. Trowa, Wufei, and Duo leapt forward, joining the fray.

Joe scrambled at Heero, his ugly face shining with blood. The slim pilot crouched and jumped forward, fastening his hands around his throat and methodically slamming his head into the floor. Joe gurgled and lost consciousness, and Heero moved on, joining the other pilots in tearing a swath of destruction through the crowd of athletes.

Scott ducked as Matt sailed overhead, hitting the wall and sliding down. Mr. Bonnes stalked forward, through the mounds of bleeding jocks, and pointed a quivering finger at the pilots, who stood, unruffled, in the center of the carnage.

"Yuy! DETENTION!" Heero smirked at that, pushing his sweaty hair back.

"Mission accomplished."


	8. Zero Night

Genre: Romance/Angst/Drama

Definite Romantic Pairings: Quatre/Trowa, Logan/Heero, Duo/Remy

Potential Pairings: Wufei/Pietro, Wufei/Pyro

* * *

"Ugh!" A pencil flew across the room, hitting the wall and rebounding off of it. Jamie levered himself off the ground slowly and trudged over, grumbling all the way about his long-division assignment.

Trowa bit the inside of his lip in irritation; really, was there some edict here against working in a calm, efficient, and above all _quiet_ manner? Looking around, he saw that the others appeared as tense as he. Why in the world did the adults force all of the students to gather in the living room and do their homework together? It would be much quieter and easier for them to do it alone, in their room. Quatre caught his eye, tilting his head towards the door in a significant manner.

The former Heavyarms pilot glanced back down at his paper, finished his last (ridiculously easy) geometry problem, gathered his papers together, and left the room. Precisely fifty seconds later, Quatre followed. At intervals of fifty seconds, the last three left the room.

"We need to talk," Quatre said abruptly when all of them were there, his aquamarine eyes slightly glassy, as if he was ill with a fever.

"Yes," Heero added.

* * *

Quatre threw his head back and swallowed a tranquilizer pill, wiping his mouth and returning to wedge himself firmly against Trowa, saying gravely, "It's a Zero night." Heero looked at him sharply, grunting, "You, too?"

"Fuck!" Duo said eloquently.

"Don't panic," Wufei interjected, "There's a logical solution. Trowa can stay with Quatre, and Duo and I will watch Heero and make sure there's as little damage as possible." Duo sighed, "You're forgetting one thing, 'Fei: Usually it takes all of us to control the Zero System in Heero. I mean, Quatre's fairly easy to take care of; he doesn't have all that much of the System left in him, so it can be controlled against harming others, right?" He glanced at Quatre, who nodded, smiling wryly.

"Harming myself is another matter," the Arabian said, pulling up one of his sleeves to expose the long, scarred furrows in his arm. Trowa glanced at it with a deep sadness in his eyes, pressing a quick kiss to Quatre's hair as he said, "I am loath to use our 'powers.' They seem-"A heartbeat of silence. "-unnatural."

"And anyway, I doubt Zero cares too much about attacking us in order to keep us from using our powers," Duo said, grinning at Heero. "Sorry, buddy. But anyway, I think we need to ask Ororo and Logan to help. I don't think leaving Trowa alone with the System is a good idea, and leaving me and Wufei with it is asking for trouble."

"What if they ask about what is happening?" Heero broke in. "I am _not_ going to tell them the truth." Wufei tacked on, "As horrifying as it is, I actually agree with Duo. We can simply tell them that it is not something we like to speak about. They seem to have too much of a moral code to press the issue."

"All right," Heero acquiesced. "Zero will take control at about eleven, if my estimation is correct."

"Have your estimations ever been incorrect?" Duo interrupted cheerfully.

"No, Duo. They have not. And you, Quatre?" The former Sandrock pilot broke away from his whispered conversation with Trowa, "Zero will take control of me at around ten-thirty. Ororo and Trowa will watch me. I'll be fine." Trowa looked at his lover dubiously and tightened his grip in worry.

* * *

"What's this about?" Logan said, amber-brown eyes scanning the room. Logan and Ororo sat on a couch in one of the small dens, facing the five new mutants. Ororo's eyes flickered immediately to where Trowa's long-fingered hand was wrapped possessively around Quatre's shoulder.

Duo leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he explained in a sober tone, "Every so often, at irregular intervals, Quatre and Heero become- possessed, I suppose you could say, by an entity called Zero. During these times, Heero and Quatre are no longer in control of their bodies; when Zero controls Quatre, it tends to focus all of its rage and hatred inward, resulting in self-mutilation. When Zero controls Heero, it attempts to destroy everything around it. Usually protecting others from Zero requires all of us, but we're rather unlucky tonight. Quatre and Heero are both going to be possessed, and we are-" A slight grimace passed over his face at the uncustomary request, "-in need of your help. If Ororo could watch Quatre with Trowa that would be very helpful."

Quatre continued, "The Zero in me is generally not outwardly violent, but I do not trust it to be alone with Trowa. Heero-" he tilted his head toward the taciturn Japanese, who sat squished between Duo and Trowa, "-His Zero is incredibly violent. If it is not controlled by all of us, then it tends to become very… deadly. Wufei and Duo will not be able to control it alone, so it would be best for Logan to help." Duo shivered, a ripple passing over his skin as his eyes darkened in remembrance.

_Thick, grainy smoke spiraled upward into the sky, the shadowy cloud blotting out the sun and leaving the barren wasteland in darkness. Sparks and flaming bits of paper flew about, lighting the gutted, hollow shell of the building. A hunched, twisted silhouette stood framed in the doorway, blood dripping from his curled fingers and a mad leer spread across his face, the flaming wasteland reflected in his dark, blood-crazed eyes._

"I will be possessed at approximately ten-thirty," Quatre said, "And Heero will be also possessed at eleven. So, will you two help us?"

"You had only to ask," the weather witch said serenely. Logan grunted assent, folding his arms across his chest.

* * *

Ororo sat ensconced in an old armchair in one of the attics, watching Quatre and Trowa converse in hurried tones. Her eyebrows beetled together in a frown of bemusement as she saw Trowa cup Quatre's face in his thin, long-fingered hands and lean in, the two sharing a long, gentle kiss, one of sorrow and love and respect. 

"You are lovers?" Ororo said, nearly flinching away when two suspicious gazes flickered to her immediately. "Yes," Quatre allowed cautiously, wary. In their time, he had been ostracized and disowned by his sisters, since it was not possible for him to produce an heir to the sizable fortune. Trowa, thankfully, hadn't suffered that; Catherine, knowing the pain her adopted brother had already gone through, had accepted their relationship, happy that her brother had found some sort of peace.

Ororo smiled in an attempt to reassure them; of course, she thought, she couldn't guarantee that all of the mansion's inhabitants would be so accepting. Scott and Jean, in particular, were rather close-minded, as was Bobby. Quatre returned the smile reflexively, turning over the switchblade knife he used in his hands, his bare feet tucked underneath him and his arms exposed to the cool, musty air.

Ororo had been very surprised and saddened at the copious silver scarring that twisted around the pale skin; she had thought that Quatre was the well-adjusted of the five, but obviously he was not. 'Unless,' the pessimistic whisper in her head said, 'for them, this was well-adjusted.' "So, when Zero is in control of you," she ventured, "Are you aware of what is going on?" Trowa said nothing, as usual, standing up and wandering over to the small window.

"Yes," Quatre answered, "I am aware of everything, but I am unable to direct my body to do anything. I am somewhat able to modify Zero's impulse to attack everyone else, and focus it on me, but it is Zero who decided to begin the self-mutilation." He looked up at Trowa and reached for him with his empathy, sending a soothing pulse of love and warmth. It was always hard for Trowa to see him go under like this, and even harder when he began to carve his own flesh.

Trowa looked down at the moonlit lawn, the massive oak trees casting spindly shadows across the silvered grass. The group of four- Duo, Wufei, Heero, and Logan- stood, sat, or in Duo's case, lounged in the small wooden gazebo, their silhouettes standing out sharply against the moonlit ocean.

Quatre, behind him, said softly, "It's beginning." Trowa spun and crouched beside him, grasping his hand and watching as Quatre's head tipped back and his teeth clenched together, the corded sinews in his neck standing out in the dim gloom. Trowa stood and moved to sit in a chair beside Ororo, watching as Quatre's pupils dilated sharply, the aquamarine iris a thin ring around a dark, still pool of shadowed water.

A hoarse, dry laughter rang through the room, unnerving Ororo greatly as Quatre- no, not Quatre, Zero, she reminded herself- met her eyes, a smile on his face.

"So someone else is here to witness Quatre's purgatory? How fitting, _lover."_ His gaze swung to Trowa, an insane light flickering in his eyes. "You are no lover of mine, Zero," Trowa ground out, naked pain in his emerald eyes.

Zero mused, "I am the one who nearly killed you. It would be so easy for me to finish the job."

"But you won't."

"No," Zero agreed grudgingly, "I won't- not now, at least. That silly little ninny you call a lover is urging me towards my goal, anyway, and I know that to harm your precious Quatre causes you more pain then anything else I could do."

Trowa nearly started from his chair but settled, his hands clamped white-knuckle-tight around the arms of the chair, splintering it. The switchblade flicked open, the steel blade shining in the light as Zero pressed the blade lightly to its own throat, teasingly opening a shallow cut down the jugular. Trowa calmed his breathing with an effort, his eyes narrow.

"Get on with it." Ororo stayed silent, watching the clash of two wills, and the agonizing emotional pain that was reflected in Trowa's eyes. So much pain, and he still forced himself to go through this for the sake of the one he loved. Such devotion, and it was repaid with threats of self-harm and suicide. What _was_ Zero?

Zero smirked, moving the blade to its left arm. With surprising control, it pressed and dragged the blade upward, a thin, bubbling line of crimson left in the cruel knife's wake.

Drip, drip, drip…

The nearly-silent dripping of blood heralded the staining of the wooden floors, the blood puddling together in a macabre sort of embrace. Zero pressed the blade down into the artery, holding it steady as it met Trowa's resigned eyes, a vindictive glint in the former's gaze. "Life is so very fragile, is it not? It would be so easy to press this blade a millimeter deeper, and end the pathetic existence of one Quatre Raberba Winner." Zero's blond hair shimmered in the moonlight, the pale skin and silvered scars gleaming, outlined and limned by the dark, spreading stains of blood.

It reversed the blade and slashed across the biceps, exposing the reddish tint of muscle. Dark, arterial blood left the body with surprising rapidness, covering the pale, musician's hand with dark, liquid life.

Zero looked up, meeting Ororo's gaze viciously as it asked Quatre silently,

_So easy to kill her, right, Little One?_ The endearment that Trowa used became a foul thing in the voice of the Zero System, a warped and twisted parody of affection.

_It would be,_ Quatre said tiredly, _But you won't do it. After all, you need a host._

_But most of me is in the shadowed one, and I am taking over him, right about…_

A silent bell tolled once-

_Now.

* * *

_

Logan twitched as Heero threw his head back, his eyes rapidly becoming unfocused and his hands clawing at his own skin, opening up bleeding furrows. Heero's legs locked straight, the thick sinews of his neck standing out sharply as he inhaled sharply, twisted once, and lashed out, fastening his hands on the gazebo railing and staring out at the sea.

"Duo." The kid's voice was hoarse, tension and agony written in every tight line of his body. The braided man moved over and helped Heero to pull off his shirt- Logan was confused; what did removing clothing have to do with this?- while Wufei kept his gun steadily trained on Heero's head.

Logan fought down the urge to growl furiously at the thick tapestry of scarring and welts that covered every inch of Heero's back. Three cratered bullet exit wounds marred his right shoulder, and thick, black scarring traced its way along his spine, corded blue scars tracing the shadows of his ribs. Five dimpled bullet entry wounds were scattered across his lower back, a pink, deep wound stretching from his left hip to his right shoulder- a sword wound- and raised welts slashed their way all over his back, a few curving out of sight. A silver scar curled across his spine before disappearing into the thatch of dark sienna-brown hair- Logan squinted at the scar, lip lifting as he saw the wires that laid underneath the skin.

Heero bent nearly double, a pained grunt escaping as he hissed through his teeth, his head twisting to face the three watchers. Pupils dilated rapidly, drowning the dark, cold blue irises in void-like ebony. Lips peeled back from his teeth into a mad, vicious grin, back arching as he began to claw wildly at his back, ripping open scars and attempting to pull the wiring from underneath his skin.

"It's supposed to control Zero," Duo explained softly, perched on the railing with throwing knives ready. "It doesn't work, but that doesn't stop Zero from trying to rip it out."

Fingers crooked into a parody of claws as Heero twisted, cat-like, and threw himself at Duo, blood streaming in a mockery of wings from the torn back. Logan stepped forward and then stopped short, warned away by Wufei's glance.

'Really, who do these kids think they are?' Logan thought, disgruntled. Duo threw the knives away and brought his arm up, just in time to keep Zero from latching onto his face and tearing it with teeth and nails. Heero- no, it's Zero now- latched on, crouched, and twisted sharply, sending Duo over his shoulder and crashing into one of the wooden posts.

Wufei moved in, slashing across with his sword to warn Zero away from Duo. Zero, intent on finishing the braided man off, circled angrily, snarling incoherent epithets. Duo shook himself and got to his feet slowly, his eyes sorrowful. Wufei moved forward, allowing Duo to gather his throwing knives. Bent over, sliding the knives into their sheathes, Duo explained softly,

"We just need to distract him. It wants to destroy the nearest thing to it, and that is the Institute. You'd be surprised at how easy it would be for Zero to completely shred the building and all its inhabitants to pieces." He turned and sprang, grappling with Zero as he fell to the floor.

The two rolled across the wooden floor, their fists blurring as they punched each other savagely, clawing and tearing at each other's skin. Duo finally ended up on top, using his height and weight as leverage. Wufei moved in, leaped into the air, and landed, swiftly sliding the blade of his sword in between two of Heero's right ribs. Zero roared in pain, pinned to the floor by the sword. Red blood, overlaid with silver moonlight, gushed from the wound, spreading quickly.

Logan inhaled sharply, shocked at Wufei's ruthless impalement of his friend. Wufei, kneeling with one knee on Zero's chest to hold it down, said, "It's the only way I can hold him still. Zero has no care for its host; it will do anything, as long as the host does not-" Zero's left arm came up, bending unnaturally- Logan winced: it looked like Zero had broken its arm deliberately- and tangled in Wufei's shirt, wrenching him off and flinging him across the room as it rolled away from the sword, the shining blade tearing through bone and flesh and lung.

Wufei's head hit the side of the gazebo and he dropped, eyes blank and a contusion rapidly rising on the back of his head. His breathing slowed, and the Chinese young man lifted a shaking hand to touch his head, wincing.

Duo swore, which Logan swiftly echoed, recognizing the signs of a severe concussion.

"I have to take 'fei to get medical attention. D'ya think you can handle it?"

"Yeah, kid. I've dealt with a few crazies in my time-"

Zero's feral howls took on a new dimension, the breaths rattling and shaking in a horrid fashion, but Zero would not be stopped. It lunged, grasping at Logan, who roared,

"GO!"

Duo grabbed Wufei's sword in one arm and swooped, grasping the dazed mutant, leaping from the gazebo and sprinting across the lawn to the warm, welcoming lights of the Institute.

Logan dug his heels into the ground, his calloused hands curled around two that matched his in bruising strength. The two opponents struggled, their eyes locked, whisky-colored gaze meeting pitiless, inhuman blue. Zero said nothing, but continued its growls, suddenly pushing away and kicking sharply at Logan's ribcage, only to find its foot trapped between Logan's side and his arm.

The Canadian smirked and then ducked as Zero twisted, his other foot coming up to brain him in the side of the head. 'Jesus, you'd think Duo would have remembered to remove the kid's shoes,' Logan thought numbly, his head ringing. Zero wrenched free and grasped his arm, beginning to do the familiar twisting movement.

"Oh no you don't!" Logan dropped to the floor, digging his claws into the hard, cedar planking. Zero finished its movement and bent forward, ripping up Logan's claws(along with ten feet of boards) and flung him away from the gazebo, sending him sailing gaily over the edge of the cliff.

Logan's eyes widened as he fell, drawing back his arms and stabbing once, desperately, at the rock cliff face. The claws sunk and held, and as his feet crashed once against the rock, he skidded once and then stopped, dangling precariously above an overhang.

A roar alerted him; he looked up and swore, "SHIT!" Zero was throwing itself from outcropping to outcropping, the broken arm flapping painfully about as it landed just above him, baring its teeth in a feral grin of triumph. Logan glanced up at the top of the cliff, which was twenty feet above him. Practically an ocean away, when you had an insane and possibly murderous entity on your tail.

"Looks like we'll see who's better at rock climbing," he muttered, pulling back his claws and hauling himself up. Zero threw itself at him, only to miss when Logan twisted sharply and kicked, hitting Zero square in the bleeding gash through his lung. Zero's head snapped back as it fell, grasping onto the overhang and scuttling up the wall like a demented spider.

Logan turned away and began to scale the cliff, the muscles in his arms and back screaming as he hauled himself over the lip of the precipice. He heard the unnerving shriek of rage from below and leaped away from the cliff, turning to see Zero come over the edge, its eyes glowing in the darkness and teeth glinting in a mad grin.

"Logan!" He turned to see the other mutants(even Quatre, looking weary and pale) sprinting towards him. "Look out!" Duo yelled. He turned-

Something gleamed in the moonlight as Zero thrust it forward. He brought his claws up and felt the impact, amber-brown eyes widening in shock.

For there, glittering in the moonlight, trapped between the claws of his left hand, were three twisted, deformed, and cracked adamantium claws.


	9. Aftermath

Author's Note: I am very grateful for your reviews. However, I don't post my work simply to be told that I'm a good writer. While the ego-stroking is very nice, I would prefer it if I could receive constructive criticism of my work. As in, tell me what you liked and disliked. To those who have already done so, _thank you!_ Did you see a mistake in the grammar? I'd like to know. Do you have a complaint about the way I've rendered their personalities? Please tell me! Similarly, please tell me what you enjoyed. Do you like my description, or think there should be more? Do you like the way I have shown the pilots as being damaged men? I want to _improve _my writing, both for my readers and for myself. And to those who have informed me that I have incorrectly rendered Wufei's name, more particularly the custom of putting the family one first, _thank you_! I do make mistakes quite often. I'm planning to revise those chapters once I am done with the story to correctly show this. Thank you all for reading this, and I'll now return you to your scheduled programming.

* * *

Duo cursed as he saw the claws glint in the moonlight. Why did Zero have to resort to _that_? It _knew,_ goddamnit it _knew_ all the hatred and pain and sorrow and terrible, terrible shame wrapped up in those unholy constructions of metal. Logan and Zero stood, silhouetted in the moonlight, the older man's eyes locked on Heero's damaged claws with an expression of shock.

Zero blinked once, and then Heero snapped back into control, his gaze focusing on the claws as a soft, low moan of agony escaped. Duo sprinted ahead of the others, grasping Heero's thin, bony shoulders and pulling him backwards. The two pairs of claws disengaged each other with a clink, Heero's arm falling limply to dangle from his shoulder.

He really didn't want to explain this, Duo thought sourly. Logan didn't seem the type to let up on a subject once he sunk his claws- hah hah, his puns were so wonderful- into it. Trowa caught up and stretched his arms out, allowing Duo to muscle Heero's unresisting body into the tallest pilot's arms, who then turned and loped back towards the Institute, bearing Heero.

The other pilots spared a glance for Logan, who stood, unmoving, on the grassy precipice, his face blank and mouth slightly open, and then turned and followed.

* * *

Logan withdrew his claws, blinking.

"What the _hell's_ going on!" This didn't even remotely make sense! He was the only person known to have survived the implantation of claws besides X 23, wherever the hell _she_ was, and they had destroyed HYDRA utterly, which ruled out Heero being a clone of him. So… either someone else decided to conduct the experiment- he was going to kill them- or… what?

For that matter, why in the world didn't the kid tell him about it? Those claws looked barely usable! In the brief glimpse he had caught, they were obviously deformed, twisted, bulging at one point but not at others, cracked and splitting slowly. But if they were adamantium, which could only be manipulated while liquid, how did they get that way? Did they have him stick his claws in a vat of lava or something?

He was definitely going to have a talk with Chuck or the kid as soon as possible. With a growl of anger, he began to walk towards the silent building.

* * *

"Come on, Yuy. You can do it." Wufei's words were surprisingly soft and encouraging, considering how he acted to everyone else. But here, with his comrades, the ones who accepted him and loved him no matter what he did, he could be this way. And right now, one of his comrades was in desperate pain.

Heero sat, now with a tattered shirt on, on their shared beds, staring at his hands, out of which protruded two silver sets of three claws each. Wufei had only seen them once before, and was still sickened every time he thought about them. Blood seeped from the torn apertures in Heero's flesh as he slowly, centimeter by centimeter, withdrew them back into his hands, the bulging parts and cracks and twists scraping torn skin raw and bloodied as they slid slowly back inside his hands, their progress slowed by the fact that they were unable to fit inside the streamlined tubes that had been designed for them.

"Almost there, Heero," Quatre said from where he laid prostrate on the bed, his arms bandaged and his consciousness swiftly drowning in the tranquilizer pills that were his only respite from constant foreign emotion. A few beads of sweat rolled down Heero's nose, dripping onto his hands. Trowa sat beside Quatre, emotionally exhausted and cleaning the switchblade knife carefully, ready to place it back inside the locked case that Quatre had purchased for it. Really, all of the pilots treated Quatre's knife like a ceremonial object. Duo was leaning against the door, a bottle of whisky in his hand, taking swigs every so often.

Thunk. The soft noise reverberated through the room as the last point of the claws disappeared, the raw skin swiftly sealing over. Heero flexed his fingers experimentally and sighed.

"If you are all planning to indulge tonight, it is safe. I won't be sleeping," he said. Wufei grasped his shoulder in a rare display of affection and disappeared into their shared closet, rummaging about for the booby-trapped suitcase that they all stored their drugs in. He removed a small bag of white powder and returned to their room, measuring out a small dose. He didn't want to be 'on the nod' for too long tonight; just long enough to cloud his brain so that he didn't have to see slick blood washing down his hands and dark, blue-black hair stiff with blood and his colony, home, shattering and splintering-

With the drug in his system, he carefully returned the bag to the suitcase, his limbs becoming rapidly heavy. He smiled at the familiar sensation and carefully lay down in his bed, closing his eyes and drifting into his earthly Nirvana.

* * *

Heero carefully cleaned up the empty bottle of Jack Daniels, the box of pills, and the remaining LSD capsules and stowed them in the suitcase, pushing it to the back of the closet. It was a good thing it was a Saturday; he did not feel up to dealing with Gray. Mostly it was her constant attempts to 'understand' him. He spared a brief moment of thanks that enough of the Zero System remained in all of the pilots to shield them from nosy telepaths.

He turned to meet Duo's gaze.

"I bet Xavier and Logan are going to drag you off to interrogate you today," Duo said in a far-too-cheerful tone from where he lounged on the bed. Quatre and Trowa remained asleep, spooned closely together in their shared bed. "Splendid," he replied dryly.

"I've been thinking... they have this big fighting team, the 'X-men'- Jesus Christ, could the old man get any more narcissistic- but they've never said what they're fighting against. Ask the Professor that. I'd bet it'll be interesting." Heero shrugged and slipped a shirt on, wincing as it rubbed against the healing scars on his back. He may have had a healing factor, but those scars were too deep to be healed in a night. "I'm going to walk around until Logan or Xavier drags me off. Do you want to wire me?"

Duo pitched him one of their gadgets, which Heero fitted into his ear and turned on. The receiver across the room crackled once and settled. "Good luck," Duo said with a whimsical smirk, waving Heero out of the room. Heero raised a hand in farewell and took one step out of their room-

"Heero-"

And fell into a crouch, gun pointed at Scott, who stood behind him, face ashen. "Do not do that again," he said. Summers nodded frantically. "Um, the Professor wants to see you. His office is up the stairs and two doors to the left." Heero rolled his eyes internally; all of the pilots had memorized the floor plans when they first arrived! He didn't need to know this, so, secreting his gun away in the holster strapped to the small of his back, he turned and ascended the staircase.

Knocking on the door, he heard the old man bid him to enter. He stepped inside, closed the door, and locked his hands behind his back, gaze roaming across the room. There was a large bay window behind the professor from which he could escape- but Logan, sensing his thoughts, moved from the corner to stand behind the Professor, blocking his way. The old man himself sat at his desk, fingers pressed together and gray eyes gazing at him sorrowfully.

* * *

Charles Xavier sighed internally; the young man looked as though he expected them to interrogate him! He stood with his back pressed against the door, shatteringly blue eyes gazing into his calmly, nothing shown but a cool, blank impassiveness.

"So, Heero. Why don't you have a seat?" He gestured to the chair before his desk.

"No, thank you, sir." Charles chewed on his lip in frustration for a second before he said, "All right, then. Logan has told me some of what happened last night. You have claws as well?" Heero's head dipped in a regal nod, dark sienna-brown bangs flopping forward to hide his eerily empty eyes. Logan's voice, tinged with amusement and frustration, intruded on his thoughts.

**Looks like it'll be like pulling teeth to get him to talk, Chuck.**

Unfortunately, yes. He focused back onto Heero, saying, "May we see them?" One elegant brow lifted before Heero lifted callused hands and turned them to face him. With an agonizing noise of crunching metal and cracking bones, overlaid with the slick slide of bloody flesh, six silver blades erupted from the tanned knuckles, the metallic color overlaid with the pink sheen of blood.

Charles stared at them, cracked, twisted, and splintered, and winced. "I would not be incorrect in assuming it is painful to extend them?" Heero nodded once. Logan spoke from behind him,

"Look, kid. We need a bit more information then that! Just nodding and shit- sorry, Chuck- and ­_stuff_ isn't going to tell us much."

Heero sighed, his deep voice rasping with exhaustion and frustration.

"Yes, it is slightly painful." Charles heard Logan's snort of disbelief and smiled internally, saying, "Only slightly? I heard bones breaking." Heero shrugged. "The damage is negligible. The healing factor will repair them in short order."

"What about retracting them?" Heero smiled; Charles was frightened by the twisted sneer, the bitterness and distrust inherent in the slight quirk of a lip. "That is worse. The claws no longer fit in the sheaths designed for them; the sheaths are twisted in the wrong direction, so to retract them, I must make them go to the side and sheath themselves in my flesh. As such, to retract them requires massive rearrangement of my tissue. The healing factor works fast, so each time I retract them, there is new muscle to tear through." Logan stepped forward,

"Can I touch 'em?" Heero stared at the burly Canadian, eyes narrowed. "Very well."

* * *

Logan walked towards Heero, unnerved by the blatant urge to bolt that he could see in the kid's eyes. It didn't look like Heero was too keen on staying, that was for sure. The kid's eyes resembled the eyes of an injured wolf that he had seen in his forays through the Canadian wilderness: cold fire burning in their depths, a silent promise to fend off death with fang and claw for as long as possible, to claw his way out of the abyss by sheer force of will, accepting help from no one, and to finally accept death with an unalterable dignity. The hunted look didn't leave as he got closer.

The kid lifted his left hand, thrusting it forward to allow Logan to look at it. The older man curled his hand around the smaller one, calluses rasping against calluses, and bent his head, whisky-brown eyes inspecting the claws. He honestly had no idea what could have caused the massive damage. Adamantium had one of the highest melting points of any of the solids; the only way to melt it or warp it the way these had been would have been to force the claws into magma. This couldn't have been done, as what Heero had said implied that the sheaths for the claws were also twisted.

Logan was uncomfortably aware of the lithe, muscular body close to him and the warmth emanating from the kid. Heero's scent was a unique one; part gunpowder and metal, part blood and the slightest sharp hint of smoke. He found it oddly addictive, in a sense. 'Perverted old man,' he thought cynically. Like he could ever find the kid attractive. Heero was what, nineteen?

The kid shifted uncomfortably, prompting him to drop Heero's hand with a mental curse, ignoring the strange sense of loss that occurred as the scarred, slim hand left his grip. He grinned briefly at the kid in a sorry attempt to comfort him and returned to Chuck's side.

**Bad damage, Chuck. Very bad damage; as in the metal melted and then reformed itself, which is impossible to do.**

**And you think that to ask him wouldn't be feasible?**

**Hell no! He'd probably just withdraw even more. I've dealt with his kind; they'll tell you what they want you to know, and no more.**

**I bow to your judgment, my friend.

* * *

**

Charles knitted his fingers together, tilting his head to the side. "So, Heero, Logan has told me about Zero. I'm curious as to what it is. It's obviously violent, but is it an alternate personality or such? Please enlighten me." Heero met his gaze squarely. "I do not wish to speak of it." With a sick, slick noise, the claws retracted, blood pouring from the torn apertures until the skin swiftly sealed over, prompting Heero to rub his knuckles fretfully and look back up.

"I'm sorry, but I do need to know about it, as it does pose a danger to the other students." The young man's eyes darkened, and for a moment Charles was uncomfortably aware of the weapons that he and his comrades seemed so fond of carrying about.

* * *

The other pilots, clustered around the receiver in their room, shared looks of trepidation. This was unexpected; they hadn't thought that the old man would be this persistent. Quatre, their strategist, scooped up the transmitter and whispered into it,

"Heero; tell him something of the truth. Just say that it's a rogue AI that infiltrated our minds. That won't reveal too much. Say that it was created to aid us in our operations. Don't say anything about the 'operations.'" He dropped the transmitter and joined the others in crouching by the receiver.

"You know, Maxwell," Wufei grumbled, "I was under the impression that sticking one's smelly shoes in my face was something undesirable. Just because we have to hide in the closet doesn't mean you can't be polite."

"Ah, shove it up your ass. Kidding, 'Fei, kidding! Don't take out the sword, please!"

* * *

Heero snorted internally. The old man was unexpectedly persistent. This could prove to be a problem. But this did prove to be an opportunity. "I will answer your question if you answer one of mine. You have this fighting team, the X-men, and yet you have not told us why they exist. The government seems to be taking a neutral stance toward the existence of mutants. The Friends of Humanity are too cowardly to attack you in open combat. For what purpose do the X-men exist?"

Logan appeared impressed, while the old man raised an eyebrow but answered readily enough. "The X-men exist to protect the non-mutants from other mutants who believe that humanity is a blight that must be extinguished. At times, a non-mutant will acquire enough funds to attack us in open combat. As such, we need to have the fighting team so that we can survive." Heero grunted.

"Now will you answer my question?"

"Affirmative. Zero is a rogue artificial intelligence that was created to aid Quatre and I in our operations."

"Operations?" Logan broke in. "What kind of operations are we talking about?" Heero's frigid gaze shifted to him. "That information is classified. Zero was intended to speed up our reaction times. Unfortunately, Zero broke free of the rigidly defined boundaries created for it and became dangerous. During the prototype testing, it burned itself onto our cerebral cortexes. It is now inextricably linked with Quatre and I. All information we learn is processed by it, and it learns and takes knowledge from us. It is dangerous, yes, but we are able to control it. Only at irregular intervals does it regain the strength needed to overwhelm the walls we have created."

The old man sighed. "I'll take your word for it. You may leave." Heero sneered at him, bowed once, and left the room.

"So, what do you think, Logan?"

"He's dangerous. These 'operations' he's talking about are obviously classified. All AI development is in the hands of SHIELD, so I'm going to go talk to Nick, see what I can find out. At the least, we'll find out if the kid's telling the truth."

"Why wouldn't he?" Logan snorted, lip lifting in a smirk at his naivety. "People like that, Chuck, know that information is power. Information of that magnitude is incredibly powerful. It's a good way to divert us from the truth, if he's lying." Logan turned to face him fully, all traces of merriment gone. "From what I've seen of the kid and his friends, they've got some big secrets, and I'm willing to bet my cigars on the fact that they'll stop at almost nothing to protect those secrets."

* * *

Rogue knocked on the door to Duo's room timidly, glancing behind her. She really hoped Kitty didn't think to check here. The door cracked open, and Duo's violet eye swept over her before it opened fully. Rogue stepped inside, and absorbed the strange tableau for a moment without speaking.

Wufei sat cross-legged in the window-seat of the large bay window, a large, shining sword laid across his knees, the Chinese mutant meticulously polishing it with a rag. His hair, usually bound up tight, hung free and loose about his shoulders. He glanced at her once with a vague look of disapproval and returned to his work, snorting audibly.

Quatre and Trowa were sitting on one of the beds, arguing over a piece of music that sat between them. Trowa looked at her once and dismissed her as being of no importance, which rather irritated her, and Quatre gave her a polite, distant smile and returned to his argument.

Heero was sitting at the desk, fingers flying across the keyboard in a blur of motion, shatteringly blue eyes staring into the computer screen as he took a sip of green tea and continued his work. He showed no reaction to her entrance. Really, that seemed better to Rogue then the veiled stares of the other three.

"Hey, Rogue," Duo greeted her cheerfully, leaning against the doorframe. "What can I do for ya?" She smiled at him and answered,

"Kitty and Jean are chasing me around to take me to the mall, and I really, _really_ don't want to go. Can I stay here for a bit?"

"Sure. Want to play cards?" The Southern girl accepted gratefully, and found herself plopped down on the floor in front of Duo, who distributed a deck. "Time for Five Card Stud!"

* * *

Charles cut off the psychic communication and rested his head in his hands, sighing. Logan, attuned to his leader's moods, was there immediately.

"What's the problem, Chuck?" Charles lifted his head and smiled tiredly, waving Logan to have a seat.

"That was Eric Lensherr. He's bringing the Acolytes and the Brotherhood back to Bayville." Logan raised an eyebrow, controlling his dislike for Magneto with an effort.

"Okay. Why?"

Charles answered with a grimace,

"Trask is on the move."

* * *

Author's Note: I realize that not much happened in this chapter. However, it is needed. I wanted to give a bit more depth as to the pilot's reactions to Heero's claws, and show their beginning relationship with Rogue. She is going to be a key player in the plot. Next chapter, I'm going to focus more on the Acolytes, Brotherhood, and the X-men Evolution cast, rather then the pilots. Also, to Nova, your email address didn't show up in your review. Email me at my address in my profile with the url of the site, and let me take a look around before I give my permission to allow you to host it, okay? Thank you all for reading this chapter, and I hope you enjoyed it. 


	10. Encounters

"I just wish they'd come and eat with us at dinner! I mean, it's not as if we force everyone to eat breakfast and lunch with us; just dinner. It's like they don't even live here, we see them so rarely." Scott grasped Jean's hand sympathetically, pushing the porch swing with his foot and listening to the creaking of the suspension chains. "On the other hand," Jean continued in a softer tone, "I'm not sure I _want_ to know them better, you know?"

"Yeah. They're pretty… intimidating, to say the least."

"I'm just tired of them always coming down in the middle of the night and grabbing the food I make and taking it. The least they could do is sit and have dinner with the rest of the Institute! By the way, how's Wufei treating you?" Scott sighed, rolling his eyes and letting his head loll comically onto Jean's shoulder as he grumbled,

"If I had a dollar for every time he calls me an 'idiotic besotted male who expects everyone to support him in his delusions of grandeur,' I'd be nearly as rich as the Professor."

"Oh, poor baby. At least you didn't get the constantly scowling, homicidal short kid who answers everything in grunts. He's like a mini-Logan!" Scott began to thrash dramatically, clutching his chest. "Oh dear God, take that horrible vision from mine eyes!"

"You're silly. It's time for dinner, anyway. Come on, I promise I didn't burn the rice this time."

* * *

Trowa sat uncomfortably in one of the old chairs that were placed around the long, stained walnut table, staring at the chestnut paneling on the walls blankly. The old man and Ororo sat on either end, with all of the pilots and Logan lined up on one side and Scott, Jean, Rogue, Kurt, Kitty, and Evan facing them. Duo and Rogue were discussing the meter of Poe's 'The Raven' in hushed tones, the former Deathscythe pilot shoveling pork dumplings into his mouth with one hand while gesturing frenetically with the other, nearly slapping Heero in the head.

Trowa glanced at Quatre, who blinked dazedly, smiling at him for a moment before turning to stare at the heaping plate in front of him with an expression of nausea. Trowa empathized; he and Quatre both disliked eating now. While none of the pilots were 'well-fed' by any stretch of the imagination, Quatre and Trowa, who had been subjected to starvation rations for most of the war, were nearly unable to survive on a conventional diet.

Heero ate quietly and mechanically, chewing each bite precisely twenty times, swallowing it, and then moving to the next dish. His meal consisted entirely of rice, pork dumplings, and rolls. He needed the carbohydrates desperately; the price of the healing factor was a vastly faster metabolism, and he burned energy away with the efficiency of a reactor. Wufei, meanwhile, was sampling each offering with an expression of disdain, nose wrinkled in disgust at the way Jean had made the dishes his family had so prided themselves on.

"Guys, do you, like, not want to eat it?" Kitty said. "I can go get you some cereal or something, if you want?"

"Oh no, we're fine," Quatre said reflexively, sticking his fork into the rice and gingerly chewing. Trowa followed his lover's lead, looking up in alarm when Kitty continued blithely, "Oh, by the way, I think it's so cute how you two mirror each other! Are you guys together?"

There was silence at the table. The clink of silverware paused, the original mansion inhabitants staring at Trowa and Quatre, waiting with shark-like intensity for an answer. Heero turned his head to meet both their gazes, his expression silently saying, 'Say what you will.' Trowa, who had always been so quiet and retiring, preferring to let Quatre speak, found himself opening his mouth and saying,

"Yes." The proud and loving smile Quatre gifted him with at that moment was worth all the prejudice he was sure was to come. He looked covertly around the table, noting the reactions. The old man still appeared blandly friendly; Kurt seemed to shrug and continue eating; Evan's face morphed into a look of revulsion, which he quickly tried to hide by glancing downward; Kitty squealed with glee and clapped her hands; Rogue thought it over for a moment and then continued to argue with Duo, and Scott and Jean's lips curled in unison, before they turned and began to whisper frantically to each other.

It was no better a reception then he expected.

* * *

"Eeew!" Evan said as soon as the original X-men had congregated in the living room. "I mean- that's _disgusting_! Two guys, kissing and stuff? Ugh!"

Kitty, who lounged on the floor in front of the TV, rolled onto her back and shrugged, "I think it's cute."

Kurt added in from his position on top of one of the bookcases, "If they love each other, I don't care."

"But Kurt," Scott argued, "You're Catholic!"

The teleporter tilted his head, adjusting his boxer shorts as he said, "And? To love your neighbor as yourself means to accept them for who they are. I mean, mein Gott, haven't you seen the pain in their eyes? They deserve to have whatever happiness they can. They are mutants, just like us, and we deserve to be able to live in peace, accepted for who we are."

Rogue interjected, "I think it's hypocritical to say that you fight against bias and discrimination and still discriminate against them for being who they are."

Evan whirled to face her, retorting, "And you think I haven't seen you getting all cozy with them? They're _dangerous_, Rogue! Didn't you see them in the Danger Room? Who's to say they're not going to unleash themselves on us? Hell, we don't even know where they came from!"

"I'm not going to base my entire view of them just on how they fight. They're actually nice guys. I mean, sure, most of them don't talk that much, but Duo'll talk your ear off if you give him a chance! And you know all those crappy Calculus assignments you're always moaning about? I've been asking them for help, and my GPA's gone up a point. You wouldn't believe how good tutors they are, Wufei especially."

"It's just… not right," Jean said sullenly.

"Oh, right, perfect Miss Wondergirl's going to define morality for everyone here," Rogue sneered.

"If you discriminate against them for being homosexuals," Kurt said in a serious tone, "You become no better then the Friends of Humanity."

"That's a low blow," Scott fired back.

Kurt shrugged. "Maybe. But it's the way I believe. You have the right to believe what you want."

Rogue stood from her armchair, saying, "Kurt's right. You have the right to believe what you want, but if I find out you've added one _ounce_ of pain onto their shoulders-" Her voice dropped an octave and became threatening, "You'll find some very… _unpleasant_ things happening to you."

* * *

Logan stared out at the ocean from his perch on the Institute's roof, hands shoved into his old jeans and flannel shirt whipping about in the stiff breeze. The moon was waning rapidly, the ocean a dark void. Only a few boats were out there, mostly yachts and recreational sailboats. He hated the water, hated the unpredictability and the deep currents that caught onto you and dragged you out screaming into the boundless ocean. From below he heard Evan grumbling about Quatre and Trowa, the window half-open to admit the breeze in order to cool Kurt off. The teleporter hated summer; his fur made it hellishly warm for him.

Logan had been surprised at dinner; he would never have thought that Trowa, one of the quietest of the new mutants, would be so- not daring, exactly, more like blunt. He had known when he first saw the two together that their relationship was much more then a simple friendship. They gravitated to each other; Quatre was always seated next to Trowa, and Trowa always had at least a finger touching Quatre. It didn't seem to be out of affection; more like they thought the other was going to be ripped away from them.

A light blinked out on the water, lighting the ocean a fathomless blue shade for a moment, the same blue as Heero's eyes when they stared into his own with a hunted expression-

"Damnit!"

The crunching of shingles made him turn, looking about until he saw the red circle of a cigarette, glowing softly in the darkness. It was Heero, obviously; no one else had that distinct scent of smoke and gunpowder. The cigarette jumped, ash trickling off the end. Logan approached and sat down at a comfortable distance from the kid, turning his Zippo over idly in his hands. Heero was wearing jeans and sneakers, a dark sweater covering his torso and blue eyes staring at him in consideration. Logan stayed silent for a few moments, and then, curious, he said,

"So, 'bout those claws…"

"Yes?" 'The kid's blunt as all hell,' Logan thought, impressed, before he continued,

"You said they and the sheaths are twisted. How'd that happen?"

Heero inhaled deeply on the cigarette, the nicotine soothing the ache of remembered trauma.

_"You depend on these too much, boy-" _

_needlesand_

_a roiling tub of magma that twists and burns the jab of a needle into his palms scraping on his claws_

_The flick of a switch_

_And heat so burning that it feels cold flows into his hands and chars his flesh from the inside out._

Could he tell Logan this? The man would probably just run to the old man and they would be interrogated. But- if he could throw them off the trail of their drugs, which he knew they were suspicious of, as he had seen Gray and Summers pawing through their things- it could be worth it. Not to mention he felt a strange… kinship with Logan, both soldiers without a war to fight, without a home or family. He stared at his palm, studying the faint outlines of the claws, dark against the moon. He hated the claws. They were a strange metaphor for his own existence; a broken blade, a cracked and fragile weapon that still possessed the ability to kill.

"I made a mistake." The words issued almost unwillingly from his mouth, startling Logan. "I became dependent on them-" The other instinctively understood what Heero meant. "-to fulfill my objectives. Because of that dependence, I made an error. To rectify that mistake and teach me the folly of dependence, they melted some metal until it became molten and siphoned it into my hands. The claws melted from the pressure and reformed. My hands grew back around them."

Logan would have been horrified at the story, and he was, but the coldly clinical and dispassionate manner Heero told it in was even more frightening. He sucked in a breath and let his head fall back against the chimney, lighting up a cigar and inhaling. He blew the smoke out, watching as it twisted in the moonlight. But somehow, he understood what Heero wanted. He didn't want sympathy or pity, or a misguided attempt to 'understand' the tatters of his psyche. He understood, because it was the way he felt himself.

"So who's this 'they' you mentioned?" Heero turned to face him, a bitter smirk curling his lips. His eyes, luminous in the moonlight, glinted with a sour sort of amusement. Logan grinned in return; obviously Heero wasn't going to give up information that important.

"Okay, then."

* * *

"'Welcome to Bayville' my ass," Pietro Lensherr, also known as Quicksilver, grumbled, dragging the first of his sister's many suitcases up to the room she had chosen for herself in the rambling Victorian that their father was renting for the former Brotherhood and Acolytes to live in. He brushed back a lock of his distinctive silvery hair, cursing when he lost his grip on the suitcase and it tumbled down to ram into Fred, who stared at it quizzically.

"Uh, 'tro, shouldn't we be getting this upstairs?"

"Damn right you should!" Wanda yelled from her position in the living room, where she was unpacking the first of many boxes.

"Language, Wanda!" Eric Lensherr, Pietro and Wanda's father, reprimanded from where he was trying to stuff several boxes through the old, wood-and-stained-glass door. He continued on, muttering, "Stupid neighbors, I could use my powers if it weren't for those peeping toms…"

Indeed, the neighbors were all outside, staring at the unorthodox moving operation. A few of the elderly ones were turning to each other and whispering in disapproving tones as Todd, AKA Toad, screeched,

"Buttfucker!" Mystique, in the guise of a respectably dressed, older woman with graying brown hair, lifted the box of pots and pans off of Todd's toe and carried it inside easily, leaving Lance, AKA Avalanche, to smack Todd upside the head and reprimand him for his language, a duty the older boy performed with all too much relish.

Pietro finished hauling the suitcase into Wanda's room, decorated, unsurprisingly, in shades of red, and threw it onto the bed, where it bounced once and then sat innocently.

"I hate you."

* * *

The suitcase did not respond.

Remy LeBeau had never believed in love at first sight.

He was, however, a notorious playboy, famed for seducing women and men who no one else could, and then leaving them broken in the dust. It was a form of entertainment for him, a challenge, and he adored challenges.

"Remy wants to go pickpocket," he said, hands on his hips and demonic eyes glaring into John's. The Australian thrust his jaw out and replied, "And I want to go get some wood to burn. Mags said we could, so there!" The Cajun rolled his eyes and slipped on a pair of sunglasses, saying,

"How 'bout a compromise? Remy will pickpocket, and we'll use the money to buy de wood for you to indulge your pyromania. Eh?"

"Eh." The two Acolytes left the small convenience store, Remy swiping a chocolate bar and hiding it discreetly in the folds of his trench coat on their way out. John ran a hand through his auburn hair and scanned the street, nudging him and saying, "Look over there! An easy mark." The Cajun stared over the tops of his sunglasses in consideration. A fairly heavyset man dressed in jeans and a sweater, his wallet bulging conspicuously in his back pocket. Perfect.

He permitted himself a shark-like grin as he motioned for John to wait while he broke away, angling across the street to loiter in the shadows of an alley, loitering about as he watched the man approach.

Twenty feet.

Ten feet.

Five.

Two.

Now.

He stepped from the shadows of the alley, adroitly angling his shoulder to press hard into the man's back while his left hand swooped, nimble fingers plucking the wallet out and secreting it away in one of his many pockets.

"Oh, I'm sorry," he offered, waving his hands about and pretending to appear embarrassed. "I wasn't watching where I was going. Cest la vie, hmm?" The man grunted at him and continued on his way, muttering about rudeness. John materialized by Remy's side, peering at the wallet eagerly.

The driver's license was quickly discarded and the money counted. John whooped when he realized the amount of pine wood he would be able to buy. He preferred pine vastly, as the many oils in the wood created a veritable explosion.

"I'm gonna burn it in the backyard- maybe it'll light the trees on fire, that'd be awesome- and get some marshmallows. It's nearly time for Christmas, anyway. At least, the way you Yanks celebrate it."

The two Acolytes strolled down the street, shouldering their way easily through the hurrying crowds, all anxious to finish their shopping. There was a flash of gold-brown in the corner of Remy's eye, and he felt light fingers- the fingers of a thief- dip into his pocket and flip the stolen wallet into the unknown person's hand.

Remy skidded to a stop and turned his head so fast he almost gave himself whiplash. A figure, swathed in a black trenchcoat, stood talking to the man they'd stolen the wallet from, returning the item flippantly. He was actually… impressed.

And then the figure turned.

The first thing he noticed was the amazing, thigh-length braid, a silky, luminous chocolate with golden highlights racing up and down. Then the expensive black sunglasses slid down, and Remy could see the roguish violet eye staring coolly at him, the pale, thin face framed by the collar of the coat. A woman? No- the strong, masculine jaw and slender hips were all male. The figure turned and walked away, hips moving in a swaggering, seductive stride, one hand rising to wave an insolent goodbye.

Remy gaped in admiration, forgetting even to be insulted by the fact that someone had just stolen something from him, the Master Thief, out of his own pocket, no less!

"Rems? Hey, _Remy!_" Remy turned, broken from his reverie.

"What?"

"You were staring."

Remy flipped John the bird, and they turned and continued to walk.

Remy was certain of one thing.

He wanted that man, wanted him with a fierce desperation that surprised even him, and Remy LeBeau always, always, _always_ got what he wanted.

* * *

Author's Note: Done. This chapter was very hard to write, although I'm unsure why. You should probably expect my next chapter of my Star Wars/Gundam Wing crossover, _When Blue Meets Gray_, to be posted before the next chapter of this. Thank you for reading, and I hope I did well with focusing on the X-men Evolution characters. Please don't forget to give me constructive criticism! 


	11. Prelude

Author's Note: One of my reviewers wanted to know what the Acolytes and Brotherhood are. The Acolytes were a group of mutants directly under Magneto's control. They consisted of Sabertooth, Gambit, Pyro, and Colossus, I believe. The Brotherhood was a group of teenage mutants that were the local thugs, and were under the control of Mystique. This group was made up of Avalanche, Quicksilver, the Scarlet Witch, Blob, and Toad. I hope that helps.

* * *

The strains of 'Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer' floated through the Xavier Institute for Gifted Children, disturbing Duo Maxwell's rest.

"Ugh…" he muttered, turning over in bed and squinting blearily, face drawn in the pale light from the window. A few snowflakes drifted lazily downwards, the top edge of the sun just beginning to rise over the horizon.

"All the other reindeer-" It was Kurt, his strong tenor voice ringing off the walls. Duo sighed and slithered out of the bed, careful not to disturb Heero, who slept curled at the end of the bed, a knife in his hand, and Trowa and Quatre, who slept tightly spooned together, the taller boy's arms wrapped around Quatre's shoulders possessively. Wufei was crouched on the window seat, his head resting on his knees. Duo scratched his chest twice, ran a hand through his braided hair, and stiffly pulled on a sweatshirt, leaving the room and stumbling down to the kitchen.

Ah, coffee. The precious, life-giving liquid that was required for a happy and healthy Duo. He poured it into the mug, added three cubes of sugar and a good-sized spoonful of milk, and sipped it slowly, relishing the heat of the mug on his chilled hands. Trowa and Quatre wandered in, the Heavyarms pilot's hair messy and sticking straight up in the back, customary turtleneck wrinkled and fraying at the elbows. They nodded to him cursorily, Quatre headed to the refrigerator, and Trowa opened a cabinet, retrieved bowls, went to the pantry, and got out Raisin Bran, which was the only remotely healthy cereal the Institute possessed.

In eerie synchronicity, Quatre poured milk into the bowls while Trowa poured in the Raisin Bran, and then, with one accord, they sat down and began to eat. Duo retrieved the newspaper from the counter, and handed it off to Wufei, who had just entered, and was now absentmindedly toasting a bagel while perusing the front page.

Heero slid silently into the kitchen, picked up a small apple, and sat down beside Duo, watching the Shinigami stare blankly into his coffee cup.

The silence was customary; all of them relished their early morning breakfasts, without the noise and chaos of the other inhabitants of the Institute. It served as a chance to reaffirm their bonds, since their routine hadn't changed since the wars. Wufei broke the silence,

"Microsoft stocks are down. Not like that's going to have much effect on you, Quatre," he finished, glancing ironically at the Arabian.

"What's not going to have much effect?" Kurt asked, sticking his head into the room, Santa hat tilted rakishly on his head. "Nothing," Wufei replied stiffly. "Okay," Kurt said amiably. "There's going to be a snowball fight later, if you guys want to join in. Everyone's starting to wake up, so…" he trailed off significantly.

"Thanks for the warning," Duo said, rocking the clear glass mug in his hands, watching the reflected light swing about on the tabletop. Heero glanced up as the thunder of footsteps on the main stairs reached them, the tidal wave of yelling and talking growing at a steady rate, until it overwhelmed everything else.

The gaggle of people poured into the kitchen, alarming the pilots. Duo's hands clenched tight around the mug, a spider webbing of cracks spreading across the glass from the pressure. Bobby glanced at Trowa, and Quatre, who sat on the taller boy's lap, blond, sleep-tousled head resting on the broad chest, and sneered, opening the pantry and grabbing a box of Froot Loops. Kitty began busily clattering around the kitchen, opening and slamming the wooden cabinets, slicing strawberries and cantaloupe.

"Quatre, Trowa, Wufei, Duo, Heero, the Professor wants to see you," Jean said from the doorway, Scott hovering behind her with a strange, triumphant light in his eyes. Quatre stirred slowly, stretched, and slid off Trowa's lap, shuffling towards the staircase. The other pilots followed, Wufei folding the newspaper and tucking it under his arm. Scott and Jean shadowed them, attempting to subtly urge them to walk a bit faster. Heero, harried, flicked his wrist, a knife shooting into his hand, spinning and holding the knife up to Jean's face, the razor-sharp tip of the blade pressing delicately into her chin, his gaze cold.

No words were said. None were needed. Jean and Scott dropped back. Quatre pushed open the heavy oak door.

The suitcase that held the whiskey, LSD, tranquilizer pills, and heroin lay, unopened, on the Professor's desk, the man himself watching them calmly, fingers pressed together.

"Come, sit down," he invited, gesturing expansively at the five chairs before his desk. The pilots sat down warily with Quatre, the peacemaker, facing Xavier.

"I'm sure you know why I've called you here," he began, only to be interrupted by Duo.

"No, we have absolutely no friggin' idea and are simply sitting here to make the room look more impressive." The professor raised a brow, coughed lightly, and started over. "Anyway, we are very concerned by the contents of this suitcase. Logan said that he smelled some illicit substances in there, and his nose is rarely, if ever, wrong. Would one of you open it, please?" Trowa glanced at Heero, who had programmed the traps.

The former Wing pilot leaned forward, dragged the suitcase towards him, and began to tap lightly on the outside of the lock. The lock disengaged, a small panel flipping up to reveal a tiny keypad. A few presses of the buttons, and the keypad slid aside, exposing a fingerprint analyzer. Duo had made the suitcase; his expertise with his hands hadn't faded after the war. Finally, the suitcase opened, and Heero slid it back onto the desk.

The professor stared at the contents gravely, reaching out and holding up the small bag of heroin to the light.

"Whose is this?" The pilots stared back in stony silence. The professor sighed.

"Very well. I'll be confiscating the drugs; if we find more in your possession, the consequences will be severe. Each of you will have mandatory therapy with me, starting today. Duo, why don't we begin with you? You'll be here for half an hour, at the most. Will the rest of you wait outside until I call one of you in?" The young men rose from their seats and left the room, leaving Duo slouched insolently in his chair.

"Duo Maxwell," Charles said thoughtfully, contemplating the young man. Large, dark violet eyes stared into his own sullenly, the callused, thin hands playing with the frayed end of the braid. "You're seventeen and were born in New York City, according to your testimony. You have no family, which matches the stories of your friends. I believe this whiskey is yours." He set the half-empty bottle of Jack Daniels on the table between them, the oily swirls of liquid dancing in the light. Duo nodded once, close-mouthed. Charles sighed mentally; it seemed that reticence wasn't only limited to Heero, then.

"Listen- I'm not here to hurt or humiliate you. I just want to know you a little bit better, so that I can understand why you drink. It's a very unhealthy habit, you know." Duo snorted and leaned forward, hands flat on the desk and gaze intent.

"Listen carefully, Chuck, and don't interrupt me, 'cause I'm only gonna tell you this once. Who in the _hell_ do you think you are, preaching to me about what's healthy or unhealthy! I don't know who you think I am, but let me tell you one thing: it'll be a cold day in hell before I become one of those stupid little automatons you've turned Summers and Gray into." Charles opened his mouth, only to shut it with an audible click when Duo continued acidically,

"_No!_ I see your little game, and I know it all too well. You want everyone to see you as their friend, as the person who can 'fix' all their little petty insecurities and problems. I don't, and neither do my comrades. We depend on no one but ourselves, and that's the way we like it!"

"Could you at least let me see-"

"What part of 'no' don't you understand, you cretin? I'll promise you something- keep digging, and you won't like what you find. You can keep the whiskey; I've known plenty of men like you," he sneered, "you probably want it for yourself." Charles massaged his temples with his fingertips, battered and worn down in the storm of Duo's relentless, furious hatred.

"Why," he murmured, "Do you and your friends find it so hard to trust in anyone? We've offered you nothing but understanding." The younger man laughed, a harsh, cracking sound, before he hissed,

"We trust _no one._ Trust is a weakness, and to trust is to leave yourself open and vulnerable to pain. Besides, none of you could understand, even if you tried."

"Very well. Will you send one of the others in, then?"

* * *

"So, Chuck, how'd the 'therapy' go?' Logan lounged indolently in one of the armchairs, watching his leader rub his eyes in aggravation. He had known this was going to happen, and truthfully, he found it kind of funny that the great psychic had finally met people that could make him lose his fabled calm. Which he was doing now in a very spectacular fashion, the burly mutant noticed.

"Badly," Charles gritted out. "Trowa and Heero just sit there and stare at me blankly like they've never even _heard_ of the English language, much less speak it; Quatre just merrily dances around the question while sipping tea; Duo rages and calls me horribly creative bad words, and Wufei fires back obscure philosophical quotations."

"So who'd the drugs belong to?" Charles sat up straighter and began to tick them off,

"The tranquilizer pills are Quatre's; the LSD belongs to Trowa; the heroin is Wufei's, and the alcohol is Duo's." Logan smirked humorlessly.

"Kinda expected that, to be honest. I've had the kid pegged as a possible alcoholic since day one. As for me…" he stretched languidly, taking a drink from the tumbler of bourbon on the desk, "I've been trying to figure out their pack structure. Every group's gotta have a leader, right? Well, these kids are all leaders: they seem to switch roles depending on what they're being confronted with. It's actually impressive; there aren't many teenagers who could just hand off authority like that. Summers, for one."

Charles rolled his shoulders irritably, and then looked up, saying slyly,

"By the way, I've noticed how you keep looking at Heero. Is there something going on between you two?"

"No!" Logan said. "I haven't even noticed that I, as you say, 'look at him.'" Charles smirked,

"You always sit across from him at dinner, and go out and sit with him on the roof. Besides-"

"We're _just_ friends," Logan interrupted. "Maybe not even that. Smoking buddies, then."

"If you say so."

* * *

Heero, once again, found himself sitting on the roof, lighter and cigarette in hand. Why was he here? It didn't make any sort of logical sense for him to keep coming up here night after night. He got nothing out of it, no food, water, or energy. As a matter of fact, it drained his energy, as he should be sleeping. So then, why? His lip twitched in irritation, shaking hands fumbling with the lighter.

That was strange, and certainly not useful. He leveled his glare at his hands, until they stopped shaking long enough to touch the lighter to the cigarette. 'I'd better enjoy this, anyway,' he thought suddenly. He certainly wasn't going to get any chances to smoke when he was dealing with all of his comrade's withdrawals. A scraping noise made him tense, hand going to his gun. Adamantium claws glinted in the starlight as Logan heaved himself over the edge, brown eyes noticing the gun and lip curling in amusement. The dark brows drew together as he saw the fine tremors in Heero's hands, the man moving closer and sitting at a respectable distance.

"What's with the shaking? You cold?" Heero snorted at that, looking up at the snowflakes that fell slowly from the partly clouded skies.

"The temperature at which I will begin shivering is approximately 15 degrees." Logan looked puzzled, "But you've got a healing factor, which burns off your energy quickly, so you'd get cold faster. How does that work?" Heero shrugged.

"Classified information." Logan gave him a sidelong look,

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you just say that 'cause you don't want to tell me."

"I do not lie."

"Then what're you shaking for?" Heero glared at him for a moment; the man was persistent, as his namesake was known to be. "Since you obviously find the idea of leaving me be to be repugnant, the reason I shake is because of my Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. The others have it as well, although it manifests differently for each of us. I have flashbacks and tremors." Logan sighed; the more he found out about Heero, the more he hated himself for prying.

"Flashbacks of what?" Heero's eyes closed, a whirlwind of images flashing across the inside of his eyelids.

_Cold steel ran so delicately across his chest-_

_A waltz by Chopin played softly as a voice thick with hunger whispered, "Pretty thing, pretty toy, make you bleed, make you cry, make you DIE!" And then there was nothing but pressure and a horrible burning, pulsing agony-_

_"Scream, damn you! SCREAM!" He did not; in fact, he spat the blood welling from his lacerated tongue into his captor's eyes. The man's eyes, alight with mad lust, loomed closer, the blade flashing in the lamplight. _

_"Oh, pretty thing, we shall have so much fun together…"_

"Heero? Heero!" Someone was shaking him, the deep voice ragged with fright. His fingers tensed in preparation to tear out the person's throat, the same way the officer had torn his chest apart and rooted around to search for the black, rotting heart that he no longer possessed. Oh God someone was _holding_ him, and whispering as if they cared-

No one could care! No one could care for a broken blade, a weapon without an enemy. He had to kill them, kill the person that lied and acted as if they loved him.

Logan stared down at the frighteningly pale face, the rose-colored lips pressed together tightly, and lines of stress running a fine tracery over Heero's skin. Almost as an afterthought, he noticed the way the too-thin shoulders melded with his chest, and the long, lean form fitted easily against his own as if they were two puzzle pieces, the scarred skin alarmingly warm, as if the inferno of Dante were burning beneath the younger man's skin.

Crystalline blue eyes flickered open, a hand, fingers curled into claws, lashed upwards in the corner of his vision. Logan's hand moved instinctively to block it, callused fingers catching Heero's hand. He felt Heero's ribs expand against him, each curving bone seeming as fragile as a twig as the younger man shook in his grip.

"Let go…" Logan released Heero with a curse.

"Sorry," he said grimly. Heero laid, spread-eagled, on the shingles of the roof, the cigarette burning, forgotten, in his hand. "Don't be," the former pilot said with a tinge of bitterness. "No one ever is."

* * *

"Welcome to the Institute, Eric," Charles said, shaking his former nemesis' hand. "Jean and Scott have already gone out and acquired the Christmas tree: make sure that John doesn't burn it, would you?"

"But of course," Eric replied, smirking. "Are there any people we should avoid? I'm sure you've acquired some new projects since I last visited." Charles turned the wheelchair and ascended the ramp, saying,

"There are five new ones you should probably tell your charges to avoid: there's Duo Maxwell, who's easily recognizable: he's got a ridiculously long braid. There's Wufei Chang; he has black hair and eyes, and he pulls his hair back so tight it's a wonder his head isn't misshapen. Trowa Barton has a strange-looking bang that covers one of his eyes, and he's the tallest person we have here now. Heero Yuy you don't have to worry about: he spends all of his time shut up in their room. He has very messy brown hair and blue eyes, and he's fairly small. Quatre Winner is probably the 'safest' of them, and I use that term loosely. He's very angelic-looking: blonde-haired and blue-eyed." Eric glanced at him,

"And these men are so dangerous for what reason?"

"Highly paranoid, reactive, and violent," Charles said humorlessly. "Not to mention highly skilled in martial arts, weaponry, and all-too-happy to rip people's throats out bare-handed. And they're drug addicts."

"And you're letting these dangerous men stay here for what reason, Charles? Am I to assume you've finally gone senile?" The professor made a rude gesture as he backed into the elevator, pressing the button.

"For your information, _Eric_, the reason I'm letting them stay is because they need to be monitored. Their abilities are dangerous, and considering their personalities, it's better to let them stay somewhere where we can attempt to help them. Quatre's a very high-level empath; so high, in fact, that there is no shielding for him, so he became addicted to tranquilizer pills. Wufei creates fire out of thin air. Trowa's a were-lion, although the lion he shifts into is huge: at least the size of a small pony. Duo's eyes glow red and he grows wings. He controls shadows. And Heero-" He trailed off, looking troubled.

"Yes?"

"Heero kills people," he said simply. "His ability is the ability to destroy life." Eric arched a brow in surprise.

"Useful. My charges should have finished moving into the guest rooms by now; I hope you don't mind that Remy brought some brandy. Christmas cheer and all, no?"

Charles murmured an assent as they entered his office, the heavy door sliding shut behind them.

* * *

Remy was bored. Not just because of the god-awful morality that positively _oozed_ from Summer's and Gray's pores, and prevented him from having any sort of fun whatsoever, but also because Wolverine wouldn't let him near his precious Harley. Not to mention that no one here knew how to play a good game of poker.

"John…" he whined. The Australian looked up from where he was carefully laying out his massive collection of lighters.

"Yeah?"

"Remy is bored!"

"Not like I can do much 'bout that," John replied, flicking a Zippo open and shut obsessively. Remy grunted in irritation, swinging his booted feet off the featherbed and taking a sip of brandy. Fanning a deck of cards open and shut, he left the room, following the trail of amusement that his empathy was feeding him. It helped, of course, that the trail was coming from the kitchen, where something that smelled temptingly like gumbo was cooking.

"Duo, no! Don't put whiskey in there!" Remy grinned when he heard Rogue's voice, the smoky tones tinged with fond exasperation.

"Come on, Rogue! Alcohol makes everything better! Come on…" A deeper voice wheedled, the sound of a spoon clinking against a bowl reaching Remy's ears. The Cajun smirked, peering around the doorframe.

Rogue's slender form, a black sweater covering her torso and brown, white-streaked hair tied into a ponytail, was standing next to the island, bowls scattered across the scratched, wooden surface and chopped pieces of shrimp littered about. A slender hand darted into Remy's field of vision, snatching a bottle of spice.

Thwack!

"Ow! Ow-wow-wow! Why'd you do that?" Rogue, spoon swinging from her hand and hands on her hips, said triumphantly, "I told you not to try and eat anything. Now come and help me chop up these peppers."

"Negative on that." The voice dropped threateningly, and Remy turned to escape while he could.

"Where are _you_ going?" A rough hand snatched his collar, spinning him about easily and propelling him into the kitchen. "Do you know him, Rogue?" She glanced at him coolly, raising an eyebrow.

"Spying on us, Remy? How droll. Yeah, you can let go of him, Duo." The hand left his collar, a blur of chestnut and black shooting past him to the oven, where a pot was boiling and rattling about alarmingly.

"Cooking's really not my forte, Rogue. I leave that up to Heero and Trowa-" The voice flattened as the man turned, violet eyes sweeping over Remy's form.

"Oh. It's you." Remy bowed mockingly, red-on-black eyes alight.

"Remy LeBeau, King of Thieves, at your service. And what might your name be?" The braided pickpocket smirked at him, twirling a knife between his fingers.

"And what makes you think I'd give my name to a petty criminal?" Remy's eyelid twitched. The man he'd been lusting after for the past week certainly had a mouth on him.

"Oh, stop being coy, Duo." Thank God for Rogue's sensible mind. "This is Duo Maxwell," Rogue tossed over her shoulder, occupied with adding the shrimp into the bowl. Remy swept forward, and before Duo could jerk away or bring that wicked knife to bear, grasped the warm, slender hand and brought it to his lips, brushing the skin as he murmured in a low voice,

"Charmed, Remy is sure."

* * *

Searchlights swept the barren plains as a C-130 Hercules flew slowly towards the runway that had been hastily made, landing gear deploying with a great clank. A slender man, dark hair combed straight back and severely parted, stood at the end of the runway, a Jeep idling beside him. The Hercules turned slowly, lined itself up with the runway, and began its descent.

With a thump that shook the jolted the surrounding buildings, the plane's wheels touched the asphalt, roaring down the runway towards the man, who watched the metal behemoth rush towards him without fear. The beast groaned lowly as it shuddered to a stop, several people rushing out onto the runway and beginning to pull the unloading ramp open.

A small canister was rushed off the plane and handed to the man, who stood, staring hungrily at the metallic cylinder in his hand, free hand caressing it in some perverted parody of affection. Inside the cylinder was his weapon, a few spare ounces of nuclear material.

"So small a thing," Trask whispered. "Such a little thing. And with this small thing, those _animals_ shall be destroyed!" Mad laughter rang out through the twilight, the man's shoulders shaking in hysteria and triumph as he shrieked to the wide skies,

"Now, now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds!"


	12. Apotheosis

**Apotheosis**

The pilots sat in one of the small rooms off the Institute's massive library, snowflakes falling silently outside and the flickering, warm light of the fire overwhelming the feeble light of dawn. Duo seemed to be trying to read the _Iliad,_ but he was more interested in the medieval Norman sword that was mounted on the wall above the stone fireplace. Trowa sat in an armchair before the fireplace with Quatre on his lap, a thick flannel blanket wrapped around them both, sharing a cup of hot chocolate, dozing quietly. Wufei, reading glasses perched solemnly on his nose, was busy translating the Professor's prized copy of Plutarch's _Lives _from Ancient Greek. Heero sat on the floor, cleaning his Glock. All of them were dressed in warm pajamas, cups of their favorite beverages beside them: Duo's was a dark coffee; Wufei's a cup of Earl Gray, and Heero's a softly steaming mug of green tea.

Rogue paused in the doorway, unwilling to disturb the peaceful scene, but she had already broken Duo's miserably short attention span.

"Rogue!" The braided man bounced up from the couch and bounded across the room, latching onto her upper arm and trying to drag her back over to the couch. Rogue nearly flinched when he touched her, but honestly, that was probably why she liked him so much: he wasn't afraid of her mutation at all, and touched her every chance he could get, which was something no one else did.

"How are you? What's going on out there? Is the Professor spouting about the 'Christmas Spirit' again?" Rogue laughed, following him and plopping down onto the couch, leaning into his side as he wrapped an arm around her comfortably.

"Fine, everyone's gathered around the tree to open presents, and of course! By the way, he sent me to get you guys to join us." Wufei grunted absently,

"I'm not Christian, therefore I don't have to celebrate it with them."

"Sorry, the Professor doesn't accept that as an excuse." Quatre opened his sleepy aquamarine eyes and sighed, sliding off of Trowa's lap and setting their hot chocolate down on the floor. Trowa made a small noise of discontent and followed his lover grumpily, the blanket trailing behind him. Rogue watched them in amusement, standing up and pulling Duo with her. Duo's arm immediately settled into its customary place on her hip, allowing himself to be led into the main living room. Heero slid his gun into the waistband of his pajamas and followed.

* * *

Quatre fingered the small box in his pocket nervously, watching the other pilots sit warily in the far corner of the room, as far away from the massive tree, spangled with beads, lights, and long chains of popcorn, as possible. A huge pile of gifts ringed the tree, and all the inhabitants of the mansion thronged around it, sprawled out on floor, couches, and chairs, Kurt even going so far as to hang by his tail from one of the ceiling rafters.

A few, small, plain presents, wrapped only in brown paper, sat apart from the rest. The Professor smiled and gestured for Jamie.

"Time for you to open the first present." The youngest mansion inhabitant whooped loudly and dove into the pile, rooting around and emerging with a large, festively wrapped present. He tore it open, revealing a new basketball, and screeched in joy. Quatre saw his lover grit his teeth in irritation, and grinned softly at him. "Who do you choose to go next?" the Professor encouraged.

Jamie looked around, his gaze landing on Rogue.

"I want Rogue to open my present." The Southerner smiled at him and accepted the misshapen, clumsily wrapped package. With deft, quick movements, she tore the wrapping off and opened the box, removing a pair of satin gloves.

"Thank you, Jamie," she said through her teeth, Quatre feeling her disappointment, "How nice." Jamie nodded happily, bouncing his basketball off the floor. "I want Duo to open my present next," she said, picking up one of the plainly wrapped boxes and pushing it at him. Duo took it, his face a mask of shock. He hadn't expected to be given anything!

"Well? Open it, lardbrain!" Duo blinked, and tore the wrapping off, revealing a huge box. He opened the box, and lifted a slightly smaller one out. He repeated it, coming up with an even smaller box.

"Hah hah bloody hah," he said dryly, smiling at her. In a minute, several consecutively smaller boxes were strewn across the floor, and Duo was left with a tiny, black velvet container. Rogue shuffled her feet, "It's really not that great-"

Duo whooped loudly, leaping across the room and seizing her around the waist, lifting her up into the air and spinning her around. "It's wonderful, Rogue! I love it!" Quatre leaned forward, peering at the glittering diamond pendant dangling from Duo's fingers, engraved with a kanji. 'Demon? It fits.' Rogue shrieked, "Put me down!" even as she laughed, kicking her legs.

Jean coughed loudly, picking up a package addressed to herself. Duo set Rogue down, violet eyes hardening. The temperature in the room dropped a few degrees, and shadows writhed angrily in the corners. Quatre calmed him with a touch of his empathy, and motioned for them to sit and 'play nice.'

* * *

"Jesus motherfuckin' _Christ!_ I thought that thing would never end!" Duo sighed and rolled onto his back, glancing at Rogue, who sat on the windowseat in a little pile of gloves and scarves, staring at them forlornly. "Yes, well," the Southern girl said quietly, "The Professor always likes to make a big spectacle out of it."

Duo rolled his eyes and reached under his bed, rummaging about for Rogue's present. Feeling it, he dragged it out and tossed it to her. The other pilots appeared as if by magic, gathering about. "You didn't have to…" Rogue said, turning it over in her hands.

"We wanted to," Trowa spoke up, ending the discussion.

"Open it, woman," Wufei said gruffly. Rogue grunted at him and removed the paper, reaching inside and removing the old, leather-bound book, gilt script flashing from the spine. Rogue turned it, peering at it.

"_The Collected Works of Edgar Allen Poe?_ What edition is this?"

"First!" Duo said in excitement, flipping off the mattress to land on his feet in front of her.

"Dated 1850, in fact," Quatre interjected, smiling. Rogue's lower lip quivered, before she burst out in laughter. "I fucking love you guys! You're the only people I know who could get their hands on something like this, illegally or not!"

"What can I say? We're special!"

* * *

Logan looked up at the measured knock on his door.

"Come in." The door creaked open, Heero sliding through the narrow aperture with a slight crease on his brow the only sign of his nervousness. Logan looked down at the small package in his hand and raised a sardonic brow.

"Didn't expect ya to be sentimental."

"It is not sentimentality," Heero said flatly. "Your motorcycle is old and rather worn down. I have money that I do not need. You need a new motorcycle. Ergo, I took it upon myself to remedy the situation."

'You have treated me well,' he thought, gazing at the burly man in front of him with something akin to affection. 'You have acted like my company was something worth your time; you do not attempt to fix me. I suppose that I could… feel something for you..' He handed him the package; Logan took it bemusedly, claw sliding out to cut open the wrapping.

Heero locked his hands behind his back and turned, slipping through the door.

"Wait." He froze at the unmistakable tone of authority in that voice, silently cursing his ingrained obedience. "Look at me." Slowly, he turned, staring at the floor. That rough, quiet tone had always been used to herald pain, to herald long weeks drugged in isolation, only waking to experience that horrible, burning pressure of slowly splitting open, fingernails ripping from their linings as he clawed at the cold chains, and the freezing steel of the knife ran down his chest-

"Heero?" He blinked and looked up at the taller man.

Logan's breath caught in his chest as Heero stared at him, his eyes unguarded- vulnerable- and so hurt, so exhausted and old, sick of death and terror and fighting for ideals that no longer existed, aching for someone- someone he could trust- to bear the load for a moment, to take him away from the cruel, fallen world.

The keys to a limited edition Harley-Davidson fell, forgotten, to the floor, as Logan reached forward, drawing the younger man to him. He didn't care about his attraction to him, he didn't care that the door was wide open. He just wanted to do something, to ease the horrible pain in Heero's eyes.

Thin fingers clenched in his flannel shirt as Heero stiffened, unsure of what to do, before he felt him relax and fall limp against him, lithe form fitting perfectly against his stocky body. For a moment he was content simply to breathe in the smell of gunpowder and blood, until Heero murmured quietly, so quietly he wasn't sure if he was meant to hear it,

"I'm tired." Logan's arms tightened around him, feeling strange (this was the most emotion he had shown to anyone that wasn't hate) before he replied,

"I know."

* * *

Duo strolled down the hallway to the pilot's room, fingering the diamond pendant Rogue had given him. He had known that he had made the right choice in befriending her; she was as loyal as the day was long, and could be trusted to inform them about what was going on this past world.

"Duo?" The sound of a French accent made him stop, squaring his shoulders under his trenchcoat. The irritating Cajun again. Sighing, he turned, demanding,

"Are you friggin' stalking me or something? 'Cause it really seems like you are!"

"Non," Remy said smoothly, red-on-black eyes gleaming as he took in the insolent cock of a hip, the irritated glint in wide violet eyes. "Remy just wants to give you your present, eh?" Duo regarded him suspiciously.

"Present, hm? Fine." Remy took his hand out from behind his back, revealing a suspiciously bottle-shaped package, presenting it to his object of affection. Duo took it and sniffed the hidden cap, face breaking into a delighted grin.

"Jack Daniels, huh? I'll have to reevaluate my opinion of you, then!" Remy smirked, only to blink in shock when Duo bounced up on his toes and gave him a swift brush of lips on the cheek, grinning impishly when he finished, saying "Thank you," before turning and running up the corridor to enjoy his new drink.

Remy lifted a hand to touch skin that was still tingling with delight, the pleasure zipping straight South. Lips curving into a smile, he mused, 'Remy will have to do that again sometime.'

* * *

Duo opened the bottle and carefully poured another shot (the tenth), tossing the drink back and feeling the sweet burn racing down his throat, making him feel complacently happy. Grinning, he slid down the wall to sprawl on the cold tiles of the bathroom, gazing at the ceiling. Heero was off somewhere; he didn't know, and didn't care. He had alcohol; all was right with the world. Quatre made a soft noise of content as he and Trowa stumbled through the doorway into their room; Duo looked over blearily, rolling over to see out the door of the bathroom. Seeing Trowa spread out behind his lover, hand insinuated into Quatre's pants, and accented voice murmuring profoundly dirty endearments, he snorted into his hand, snickering loudly as he rolled over, hitting the toilet.

'You devil, Tro!'

Staring up at the ceiling, he blinked, wavering vision presenting a picture of red-on-black eyes, glinting with sardonic humor and even a little bit of… yearning?

'Yeah, right. He just wants you for your looks. Don't be so fucking optimistic; you don't deserve it.' Duo sighed. 'And they call me cynical. He's so friggin' hot, though!' Unbidden, his mind provided him with an image of dark cinnamon hair, tied back in a short ponytail at the nape of his neck, a swath of tanned skin, strong jaw and sensual lips framed by scratchy stubble that would feel ticklish against his skin, a long, lean body that spoke of tightly controlled power, and that delectable accent.

'You know his type; a quick fuck, nothing more. You've had enough one-night stands; don't need another notch on the bedpost, do we?' A few soft moans drifted to his ears, the sound of flesh on flesh, a few buttons popped, and then Quatre let loose a muffled scream. Duo closed his eyes, the shot glass rolling from his fingers.

'Just a quick fuck.'

He smiled.

'Another notch on the bedpost would piss the Professor off, though.'

* * *

Wufei flipped through an anthology of haiku, settling into one of the plush armchairs in the far corner from the massive doors to the hallway outside of the library. Noise made him look up, reading glasses sliding down his noise.

"Go away Todd! I'm going to study, and I don't need you following me."

"Well, if you'd tol' me you were gonna study, I wouldn't 've followed you all the way down here, would I? It's Christmas Day, why're you studying anyway, man?"

The voice was stiff and cold- "Because I want to."

"Whatever."

Wufei waited a moment, and hearing nothing, went back to his book.

_In the dark garden_

_Of the night_

_The peony hides itself._

Wufei sighed, rubbing fretfully at his forehead. He was ill at ease here; there were no mobile suits, for Nataku's sake! They were the peonies hiding in the dark garden of this backward, barely-civilized past. He wanted Nataku, wanted it desperately, even though the battered and well-loved pieces now lay scattered in a peaceful forest a thousand years in the future.

Nataku… Meiran. Even so many years later, that name still made him feel like he had been thrown into super-cooled liquid. 'Damnit!' His fist came into bruising contact with his leg, the shockwaves of pain reverberating from his knee up into his chest.

"Why won't you stop torturing me, Meiran?" he breathed softly, the book forgotten.

"Why won't who stop torturing you?" Wufei looked up, measuring the man in front of him with eyes alone as the other rounded the corner of the bookshelf, carrying a huge stack of books written in Latin. He had strange, mercury eyes, white hair- dyed, probably, since he obviously wasn't an albino- gelled back into a streamlined shape, and the palest skin Wufei had ever seen.

"No one," he said shortly, looking back down at his book. There was a grunt of dissatisfaction from the other man, but he subsided, picking up Caesar's account of the Gallic Wars. Wufei listened tensely to the man's muttering, wishing that he would go away and leave him to his own devices.

A fluttering breeze disturbed him, making him look up in irritation. "Look, you-" his insult died away, half-formed, as he stared at the sight before him. The pale man was flipping pages in the book so quickly that his hands were a blur, the speed utterly inhuman. Done, he put the book down beside him; noticing Wufei's stare, he grinned shyly, pale fingers twisting around each other.

Pietro was rather entranced by the man in front of him; in a definite romantic way, of course. He accepted the fact that he was gay; when he had tried to tell Eric (he still couldn't bring himself to call Eric 'father') had stared at him as if he was stupid and said, "You're gay. Yes, I knew; I would have been terrified had you turned out to be straight."

He was very exotic-looking; Chinese, if his estimation was correct.

"My talent is that everything I do is speeded up," he offered. The man looked at him consideringly, "So you actually understood what you read?"

"Yes. It was a collection of letters that Caesar sent back to Rome talking about his fights against the barbarians in Gaul. Utter propaganda, of course; at one point he fends off twenty Gauls with his fists."

"It served its purpose well," the man retorted, obsidian gaze warming behind the rectangular lenses of his glasses. Pietro murmured agreement, and then said,

"I don't believe I know your name." He extended a hand, "I'm Pietro Lensherr. Pleased to meet your acquaintance…" The man in front of him also reached forward, taking his hand and shaking it once, dark eyes neutral. Pietro felt electricity spark and arc between them as the man said,

"I am Wufei Chang."

* * *

"Rogue?" Duo slurred. His friend looked over at him from her absent perusal of her present,

"Yeah?"

"Could you go turn off the light? It really hurts my head," he said piteously, squeezing his eyes shut. Rogue got up and crossed the room, concerned. Sliding on a thin, silk glove, she rested her hand on Duo's forehead, checking for a fever, even as she turned off the lights with her other hand.

"You don't have a fever. Did you drink too much of the Jack the Cajun gave you?" Duo murmured assent, flinging his arm out as he searched for the glass of water and Advil that Quatre had thoughtfully left him.

But his hand contacted something soft and warm.

_Oh shit!_

Rogue's slim frame began to shake, green eyes shifting to violet, even as she made a breaking, shivering moaning noise. Duo's eyes rolled back in his head, body arching off the mattress, and then they both fell limp.

Rogue laid on the floor, mouth half-open and a thin stream of saliva trickling down, green eyes wide and horrified.

Duo lay as if dead; his chest barely moved, eyelids half-shut and face utterly slack and chalk-white.

Snow fell outside the window.


	13. Explanations

A/N: This is where it all starts to go to shit. Do not expect the happiest of endings, folks. Those with low tolerance for angst should turn off their computers, hide in the corner shaking, and never, never look at my author profile again.

* * *

Logan's head snapped up as he heard Chuck's voice blow into his head with the force of a hurricane.

**Logan, Rogue's having an attack! Get to Duo's room, quickly. I'll meet you there.**

Claws burst from callused knuckles, and Logan ran from the room.

He found Rogue thrashing and screaming, Chuck's hands pressed to his head as he reached for her tattered mind. The door shattered under the force of a kick, and he turned, dropping into a fighting stance with his claws extended, snarling.

Heero leapt through the wreckage, madly gleaming eyes immediately locking on Duo's frozen body. Quatre and Trowa followed, guns drawn and pointed straight at him. Heero's head turned mechanically; seeing Duo's paleness, he snarled his rage and leapt forward, twisted and broken claws sliding forward. Logan slid into his path, muscular arms sliding around alarmingly thin shoulders, pulling Heero back against his chest, and muscling him out of the room. The boy fought with the mindless brutality of a demon, words indistinguishable in his growls.

"Heero!" Logan hissed into his ear, tightening his grip. "Calm DOWN!" The boy bucked against him, angered beyond reasoning. The animal in Logan howled at the challenge to his authority, and Logan, adrenaline running high from the tension and body reacting to the friction, responded.

Uncaring of pain, he bit down on the back of Heero's neck, growling against the skin. Blood, hot and coppery, burst across his tongue, and he swallowed it like a desperate man. Heero's fragile ribs shook under his grip, and Logan felt them crack. Almost tenderly, he licked the shuddering skin beneath his teeth, as if in apology.

Heero made a long, low noise, and, responding to primal instinct, relaxed, fingers twitching. The beast in Logan howled its satisfaction, its possession of the younger man. "Let's get out of here," Logan said.

"Duo needs me," Heero argued. "Yeah, so? What can you do for him? I want to talk to ya, anyway." Heero opened his mouth to retort, and immediately went limp once more when he felt Logan's teeth clamp down warningly.

"So you want to use me, too?" Logan heard the flat monotone creep into Heero's voice, and mentally winced. "No, that's not it at all. Listen, we'll talk it out, okay? And your friend Winner can call you when Duo wakes up." Heero sagged in his grip, silent.

'You just have to fuck everything up, don't you, Logan?'

* * *

Quatre bent down over Duo's frighteningly pale features, running trembling hands across the well-loved features, the soft lips, and straight, aristocratic nose, at odds with his gutter-rat beginnings.

He and Trowa had immediately dragged Duo out of their bedroom and to the attic, collecting Wufei on the way. Now they all sat in a cleared space, newly empty boxes of Christmas ornaments piled high around them. "This is a nice Christmas present, eh, Trowa?" Quatre muttered, reaching back to stroke the golden fur of the massive lion behind him. Trowa had elected to shift forms, his hearing being much better in the feline one. Trowa made a rumbling noise of agreement.

"Logan took Heero to the roof," Wufei said, fingers restlessly moving over his gun, assembling and disassembling it. Quatre made a noise of acknowledgement, bending over Duo and peeling back an eyelid to check his pupils.

Duo twitched in his grip, Quatre immediately rocking back onto his heels, hands held out to show his lack of a weapon. The American looked around frantically and seized Quatre's shoulders, shaking him.

"Rogue? Where is she?"

"I- I-"

"_Where?_" Trowa growled warning, tail flicking back and forth and emerald eyes fixed on Duo. Duo let go of Quatre at last, leaving him to rub feeling back into his shoulders, and stood, running out of the attic and down the stairs. Wufei met Quatre's eyes wearily as the thumps of Duo's bare feet faded, brow arched in a sardonic smile.

"Shall we go and save the day, then?"

"What else do you expect?"

* * *

_Rogue was lost._

_She screamed with terror, but her voice was unheard. She shut her eyes but still saw._

_Saw huge robots tearing each other apart with graceless fury, and the men and women inside them fall into the void of space, hands clawing at their throats and faces bulging, blackening-_

_She stared down the barrel of a gun, Heero's blue eyes cold- cold as ice and space- and hard as diamond. "Do it, Yuy," she heard herself say in Duo's voice. The gun wavered, shuddered, Heero's face momentarily slid into an expression of bone-deep agony, and then the gun lowered._

_The blade of a knife ran down her chest, dulled and blunt, and her skin opened like a flower, crimson flowing down to drip into the already thick pool of blood. Her torturer, smiling like a demon, stepped closer, and ran a finger down the slice, lifting the blood to his lips and licking it off. _

_"Mmm… sweet." She felt unfamiliar lips twist into a smirk, and cracked and bleeding tongue shape words that hissed dryly out of her mouth._

_"Didn't know Oz employed fucking vampires." The man's face was impassive, and he ran coarse hands over her face, probing the bruises. "You have very nice bone structure," he remarked off-handedly. "I'll enjoy ruining it." And all was pain and brightness-_

_She held Quatre's trembling body to her chest, rocking him as he keened lowly, hands pressed to his head as he tried to keep out the deaths of thousands. Zero whispered in her head, as it did in all of theirs. The sound of footsteps made her turn, and silently offer Quatre's shaking form to Trowa, who took it with saddened eyes and cradled him like a fragile porcelain doll-_

_"Rogue!"_

_They stood back-to-back in the streets of New York, watching Wing Zero fragmenting and falling to shreds as it fired the Buster Rifle once more. She glanced at Zech's face, then Trowa's, Quatre's, and Wufei's, and grinned. Well-loved and well-known faces, the three she could trust beyond all others, the three she depended on. With deliberate movements, movements practiced a thousand times before, movements, somehow, she had always known she'd perform, she moved a hand to the self-destruction switch-_

_"Rogue!"_

_Sobs hitched in her chest, limbs trembling as she woke from a nightmare of Father Maxwell's grinning corpse tracing ice-cold lips over her face, cold and rotting hands skimming over her body with the considerate touch of a lover. Eyes wide and frightened, she stared into the darkness of her small room._

_A warm hand settled on her shoulder, and she turned to meet Quatre's understanding, aquamarine gaze. Trowa stood uncomfortably behind him, shifting from foot to foot. Even Wufei, the prissy guy, sat on the window seat, looking sulkily concerned. Heero was guarding the doorway._

_"It's okay," Quatre whispered, "It's okay. We all understand. We love you, Duo. It's okay. Everything will be okay." _

_And for one paltry moment, she allowed herself to believe that-_

_"Rogue, can you hear me?"_

_"Professor!" she screamed, squeezing her eyes shut against the montage of faces blowing apart into shattered, red-slicked bits. Shattered by her hand. A strong hand reached for hers and jerked her out of the nightmare._

She woke sobbing, clawing at the sheets beneath her as she shook her head, trying to erase the memories of thousands dead, bulging and blackening and dying by the hand of her friend, the braided, beautiful boy who drank and played poker and smiled constantly and called her 'Roguey.'

No, not Duo. Not him, please God not him. Don't let those long-fingered pale hands be soaked with blood as she knew they must be. Swallowing her tears, she lifted her head to meet the calm gray gaze of the Professor.

"Professor. He- he- he _killed_ them! He killed all of them!" Duo came tearing into the room then, eyes wild and dark, pale as she was on her worst days. The other three followed, one in the form of a lion that took up an entire corner of the room. Duo's violet eyes zeroed in on her, and, swallowing, he spoke.

"R-Rogue? Rogue, are you okay?" He took a step forward, hands outstretched, palms-up, as if in supplication. Rogue began to shake. The hands that had killed thousands, the hands that belonged to the boy that was Death incarnate, Death wearing the guise of an angel. The hands that were drenched in blood, reaching for her to take-

"GET AWAY FROM ME!" Her voice sounded horrifically strange to her own ears, raw and bloody with screaming. Duo stopped immediately, and the dark eyes filled with hurt, hurt so bone-deep and wearied that it made her want to reach and comfort him. She made a sound, and Duo took it as encouragement, stepping forward again.

"_Murderer!_" she hissed, scrambling back to press herself into the headboard. "Murderer! I saw it! You killed them all! You killed all of them with your _fucking_ bombs and guns and whatever the hell that giant robot was! You _bastard! _I can't believe I let you touch me!"

Duo flinched with each word she spoke, and as she stopped to take a breath, chest heaving, his shoulders slumped and his hands dropped to his sides. He said nothing for a moment, and reached behind himself, groping for a friendly hand. Quatre took his hand and squeezed it.

"I don't expect you to understand, Rogue," he said quietly, heavily, as though each word was dragged out from the abyssal depths of his body. "Hell, I don't even understand it, myself." He pushed his hair back fretfully. "I'm… sorry."

She sneered at him. "The only way you can apologize now is to explain what's going on in that head of yours. Like, what those robots were, and those space battles. If you tell me why you killed all those people, _maybe…_ I'll understand." Duo closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. Quatre and Wufei glanced at each other, and then, seeming to come to a decision, nodded slowly.

"Alright, then." Duo said. "Alright, then."

* * *

Heero struck the match with trembling fingers, lit a cigarette, and swallowed the smoke. Logan, sitting behind him, propped against the chimney and looking comfortable in the icy weather, watched him, making his nerves tingle, his mind screaming possible escape routes and ways to incapacitate the watcher.

Or at least, that was what his mind _should_ have been doing.

The silence in his head was odd and frightening to him, who had lived three years with the mad ravings of the Zero System his only constant companion. And yet Zero seemed to accept this man behind him as alpha, as strong enough to hand its host over to, strong enough to protect its host from himself.

He almost felt safe.

Heero would be lying if he said that Logan didn't affect him. The man seemed almost foolishly kind at times, but deadly enough to back it up. He almost… seemed like what Heero needed. Someone to keep him from trying to do too much, someone who could command him well. Someone to give him a mission, a goal to work towards.

'Not like J,' Heero thought with an inaudible snort.

"What's so funny?" Heero glanced at Logan through the fringe of his bangs, and lifted a corner of his lip in a slight smile.

"When I'm around you… I almost feel safe."

"What do you mean?"

"Zero accepts you, so it no longer rants when you're around. The silence is a rare gift." He shrugged. "I feel as though I can trust you with myself; that I can trust you not to break me apart like J did, and remake me for your own purposes. When I'm around you, I don't feel like I need to hide in a corner or shoot everyone that looks at me."

"You're shivering." Heero took a drag off the cigarette, blinking. "What of it?" Logan rolled his eyes heavenward, and opened his arms. "C'mere, you. You're gonna freeze to death if you insist on wandering 'round in only that silly T-shirt and jeans." Heero met the whisky-brown gaze searchingly. Logan sighed.

"I'm not going to hurt you, kid. You'd probably gut me if I tried." Heero thumbed the safety off on his Glock, and cautiously moved over to settle in between Logan's spread legs. He rested the Glock in his lap, shivering when he felt warm air gust over the back of his neck as Logan laughed.

"Yeah, I get it. You're willing to kill me, got it. You can stop waving that gun around now." Heero said nothing, leaning back warily. Muscular arms came up and wrapped around his chest, pulling him back to rest against a broad chest. He felt Logan sniff the back of his neck.

"Ya smell nice."

"Like blood, I'm guessing," he said drolly.

"More like gunpowder and smoke. I'm… glad you feel safe around me." Heero cast about for something to say, some way to answer that simple admission of caring. He felt a kinship with this man, felt as though he could trust this man with his burdens and his secrets, his guilt and his memories.

"I… am, too. I've never felt safe, before."

* * *

Wufei glanced at his comrades as they sat on the couch in the main living room. He, frankly, had argued for lying about their pasts, but moralistic Duo refused to. No matter. Quatre was twisting his fingers together, worrying his lower lip so badly that blood welled up in the scrapes. Trowa finally noticed and gently separated his lover's hands, taking them into his own. Wufei squeezed his eyes shut as the pounding headache in his skull intensified, almost as if in warning.

Summers and Grey were sitting almost on top of each other, staring at the pilots distrustfully. The newcomers (the Brotherhood and the Acolytes, if he remembered their names correctly) ranged around the room, the Frenchman's red-on-black eyes riveted on Duo's weary face. Rogue, wrapped in a worn flannel blanket, sat shivering before the fireplace, paler then normal. Logan leaned against the doorframe, dark eyes focused on Heero's shrunken, apathetic form.

"Okay," Duo said at last. He swallowed. "I- _We'll_ tell you where we're from. But-" he cut off Grey's question ruthlessly, "-the _first_ time we're interrupted, we're stopping and leaving. Got that?" There was a murmur of assent. "Okay." Duo glanced at Wufei, pleading with his eyes for the most scholarly of them to take the burden of history from his shoulders.

Wufei smiled slightly, met Pietro's cerulean blue eyes, clasped his hands together, and began to speak in what Duo had sneeringly referred to as his 'you're an idiot and I'm not' voice.

"In the year 2357," he paused, waiting for interruptions, but finding none, continued, "the countries of France and Germany got into a nuclear standoff with one another. Both wanted a monopoly on the valuable technology that had been created recently in a top-secret European Union laboratory. This technology was a computer system capable of processing input from a system of fifty gyroscopes at a speed hitherto unknown. It was used to create the first operational Mobile Suits.

Before that time, mobile suits, or MS as they were jocularly called, were unable to be used, because they inevitably overbalanced and fell, destroying both the suit and the pilot. The gyroscopes alleviated this problem." He looked around, and seeing the expressions of disbelief and confusion, elaborated.

"A mobile suit is basically a mechanical humanoid war machine, generally ranging from thirty feet high to one-hundred. They require a human pilot to be utilized effectively. But no matter.

A French family, the Peacecrafts, who had made a fortune out of providing materials to EU laboratories, mobilized their massive private army and quickly took over Europe, renaming the entire continent the Sanq Kingdom, in honor of the family's founder, Milliardo Sanq Peacecraft. Once they had gained victory, they threw away their weapons and began advocating complete pacifism for every nation on the Earth, a contemptible and idealistic plan.

While this was going on, Japan completed building the first space colony cluster, L1. A colony cluster is a grouping of up to twenty ovoid, metal space stations, each capable of housing up to half a million civilians. In honor of this achievement, the dating system was changed from A.D (Anno Domini, which means 'In the Year of Our Lord') to A.C, After Colony.

Other countries also began building colonies. The United States built L2, Sanq L3, Saudi Arabia L4, and my own nation, the People's Republic of China, built L5. At this time, the United States, using its considerable economic might, forced the rest of the world to join a new group called the Earth Sphere Alliance, or ESA, which would govern both the planet Earth and its outlying colonies.

It was decided that one person would be elected King or Queen of the entire Earth Sphere, although their job was largely ceremonial. The nations would mostly be free to govern themselves. However, the ESA began to discriminate against the colonists, treating them as second-class citizens, inferior to Earth-siders. When the colonies protested, the ESA cut off trade between them.

A colonist leader named Heero Yuy- the man our Heero's alias is after- was assassinated by a secret paramilitary organization called Oz, that worked inside the ESA.

Five scientists, one for each colony cluster, swore revenge against Oz and began to build, out of a metal that we know as gundanium (but in your world is adamantium), five huge, unstoppable mobile suits, called the Gundams.

They chose and trained five pilots for the Gundams- us five. Heero had much more training then the rest of us…" Wufei trailed off, refusing to speak about the rest. Quatre took over.

"We were sent to Earth disguised as shooting stars in a operation called Meteor. None of us knew that there were other fighters, so we just ran into each other. I unified all of us into one group. We… made many mistakes." Duo laughed hoarsely.

"Damn right, Q-ball!" Duo brushed cursorily at his eyes and said, "The leader of Oz, Treize Kushrenada, manipulated us into killing a group of what we thought were Oz leaders. They weren't, though. They were _Alliance_ leaders, meeting to discuss forming a peace treaty with the colonies.

After that, the colonies went totally batshit insane and stopped trusting us. A few weeks after that mistake, Oz took over the L1 colony cluster and threatened to blow it up unless we surrendered ourselves and our Gundams. Heero blew himself up, sacrificing himself and his Gundam for the colonies." Duo slowly became aware of a low growling noise, coming from Logan, whose dark eyes were fixed on Heero's hunched body. 'Interesting; didn't know he was so protective of Hee-chan.'

"We kept Oz on the run for three years. We were captured and tortured many times, but always managed to escape. Well, time went by, and eventually the scientists created a computer system called the Zero System. Zero was an artificial intelligence that allowed a mobile suit pilot to assimilate themselves into the suit, speeding up their reaction time ten-fold. On the first test run, though, the pilot went crazy.

We all came in contact with Zero at one time or another, but now Zero lives in Heero. Eventually we destroyed Oz, and won freedom for ourselves and our home." Duo looked around the room and spread his hands.

"We are the Gundam pilots. Assassins, terrorists, freedom fighters, zealots. Any questions?"

"Yeah. How the hell are we supposed to believe _that_?" Evan said brazenly. Heero lifted his head, dark eyes drilling a hole into Evan's head.

"Would you like to live it yourself?" Evan swallowed and then said confidently, "Fine. Professor?"

"Are you sure, Evan?" the Professor said. "I'm not sure you have the mental-"

"Do it, okay?" The Professor closed his eyes and sighed. "All right. Wait a moment." For a moment there was nothing but silence, and then it was broken by Evan's earsplitting screams as he fell like a puppet without strings, writhing on the floor. "STOP IT! STOP IT! For _God's sake,_ stop it!" The Professor cut the connection, and massaged his forehead. "Would anyone else like to try?'

There was nothing but silence in the room.

* * *

A/N: Next chapter, Trask's plan comes to light, and the pilots and mutants are forced to fight for their world. Romance plays a part, as well. 


	14. Sunset

Sirens wailed, Jeeps crossing the tarmac on urgent missions as they loaded personnel and supplies into the massive plane that reclined, propellers whirling, at the end of the runway. Trask folded his arms across his chest as he watched the heavy steel truck roll slowly towards the ramp. The small cone on top of it- a precious nuclear warhead- wobbled slightly as the truck hit the ramp and moved inside the plane's belly.

Good. Trask nodded decisively and turned to his fleet of Sentinels. They knelt, silent and unmoving before him, red eyes dark and flat, their weapons primed and ready.

Good. Unbidden, his hand dropped to the Glock at his hip, switching the safety back and forth in a nervous tic. His soldiers, standing respectfully behind him, exchanged glances and moved closer.

"Tell the pilots to get ready to fly to Bayville, New York, and hold their pattern around it. They are _not_ to drop the bomb without my orders. Inform the Sentinel commander that he is to launch Fifth Company to accompany the jet. Are the animals caged?" His voice was clipped and brisk, only the twitching of his mustache and the gleaming, fanatical light in his eyes giving away the insane, cracked soul that animated the lean body.

"Yes, sir. The mutants-" the soldier's partner elbowed him in the side, "-sorry, sir, the animals have been locked up for the night."

"Use that word again, soldier," Trask said evenly, "and you'll find yourself used in one of the experiments."

"Sir! Sir, one of the animals has escaped!" The private screamed over the roar of the accelerating jet, waving his hat frantically to catch the Commander's attention. Trask turned calmly. "Really, Private?"

"Yes, sir."

"Which one?"

"The one known as X 23, sir." With a smooth, clean movement, Trask flicked the safety off the Glock and fired three bullets, piercing the man's Kevlar body armor and tearing through the aorta. The bodyguards behind him didn't bat an eye, used to their commander's policy of dealing with failure. The man gurgled, blood pumping from the rupture with each beat of his failing heart. His legs visibly weakened, and he finally sank to the tarmac, eyes glazing.

"Find her. Bring her to me when she has been captured. Dismissed."

"Sir!" the bodyguards barked in unison, pivoting and marching off towards the dog kennels. Trask sighed. Such incompetence… Never mind that. He glanced at his watch, mustache twitching ever faster.

In three hours, twenty minutes, and fifty-five seconds, that den of iniquity known as the Xavier Institute for Gifted Children would be eliminated from the face of the earth, and the humans could reclaim their world once more.

Trask clenched his hand around the locket at his throat, thumb stroking over the lock of blonde hair kept within, bound neatly with a blue ribbon. "I will get revenge for you, Mary."

'I promise.'

* * *

"So, you're a soldier?" Remy asked, lounging in the doorway of the bathroom. The object of his affections looked up from where he was methodically emptying every bottle of alcohol down the toilet, violet eyes flashing.

"Jesus, _yes,_ okay! Are you fucking deaf as well as stupid?" Remy said nothing. "Why're you giving up the drink?" Duo snickered hoarsely. "Zero is starting to become restless. I can't afford to have my reaction time slowed."

"Aren't you going to have withdrawal?"

"Probably. I'll deal with it; I've had worse, after all."

"Remy is curious…" Duo, finished emptying the bottles, rubbed wearily at his face and sighed, "Yeah?"

"Remy wonders if you'd spar with him, maybe?" Violet eyes flickered to him, cold and assessing. "What's in it for you? Gathering intelligence?"

"Non!" Duo smirked. "Good. I'd hate to have to kill someone so good-looking." Remy felt hope flutter in his gut; it seemed maybe his affections were reciprocated. "Come on, Cajun. Are you going to stand there like a gutted fish, or actually give me a fucking challenge?" Remy blinked as Duo slid lithely by him, a pale hand skating lightly across his chest before it was gone, secreted away in Duo's coat.

Remy followed him down to the gym, shedding his duster and hanging it from the wall. Duo shucked off his coat, baring pale arms, deceptively muscled and gleaming with pink and silver scars. Knife after knife clattered from his hidden sheaths, forming a haphazard pile on the floor. He turned to meet Remy's gaze, his eyes roaming appreciatively up and down. "Nice, Cajun. Think you might actually be a challenge." Remy smiled lopsidedly, toed off his boots, and sprang.

Duo rushed to meet him, their bodies colliding, and hands twining together, pushing as the two grappled, seeking advantage. Duo suddenly twisted, thin back sliding across Remy's chest as he crouched, wedging his shoulder into Remy's belly and heaving upward. Remy, used to this tactic, flipped in midair, striking out with his heel into his opponent's shoulder.

Duo absorbed the impact easily, letting go of Remy's hands and springing backward. The two circled each other warily for a moment, and then Duo dropped once more and leaped forward, sweeping out with his leg. Remy leaped over the kick and grabbed his shoulders, pulling him over and wrestling him onto the ground. Duo fell, hit the ground, and rolled into Remy's legs, curling an arm around his ankles and jerking them closed.

Remy fell, grasped Duo's biceps, and jerked him over, rolling on top of him and tangling his legs with Duo's, holding him down. Duo bucked experimentally underneath him (not knowing the effect the movement was having on Remy's libido) and relaxed.

"Yield," he panted. Duo shrugged. "I yield." Remy rocked back onto his heels, unaccountably disappointed that this broken, stubborn soul hadn't put up more of a fight. Duo lay placidly underneath him, and then grinned.

"So, what do you want for your trophy?"

"Trophy?" Remy echoed dumbly. Duo sighed. "Yeah, numbnuts, trophy. Aren't many who can beat me in a hand-to-hand fight, after all. So? Limited-time offer, you know. Tick-tock, tick-tock." Remy settled back, careful not to crush Duo's belly underneath his weight. Running a hand over his stubble, he thought for a moment, and then brightened.

"Remy wants a kiss." Looking down at Duo, he was surprised when Duo didn't react, and then a slow smile spread across the younger man's face. "Well, why didn't you say so?" Duo fairly purred, full lips upturned in invitation. Remy sat, frozen, for a moment, and then swiftly bent.

Carefully, he slid a hand under Duo's head, feeling the silky slide of chestnut hair across his fingers, twining his fingers in the lustrous strands. Duo reached up with a pale, long-fingered hand to cup the side of his face, palm rasping against the stubble, and curved the other hand around the back of Remy's head.

"Y'know," Duo said mischievously, "If I'd known you wanted to kiss me, I'd have done this a lot earlier." Remy leaned forward, sealed his lips on the smiling mouth, and with a deft twist and angling of heads, he was inside, licking tiny ridged teeth, rejoicing in the slick slide of tongue on tongue, the warm sunshine taste of good whiskey, metallic sorrow and blood, and the bitter tinting of mutation.

Duo's hands slid down his back, kneading at the deep grooves along his spine, nails scraping lightly. Remy hissed into Duo's wicked mouth, and Duo breathed his breath into him, an exchange of pain and understanding. Long, slender legs locked around his waist, and they were oh-so-slowly grinding together on the floor of the gym, warm electricity skittering up Remy's spine.

Remy closed his eyes against the metallic silver taint in Duo's eyes- Zero- and deepened the kiss, claiming dominance back from Duo. His lungs burned, and he drew back, opening his eyes to stare into the crystalline amethyst gaze. They said nothing for a while, and then Duo smiled.

"Want to try again? That certainly wasn't the best I've ever had." Remy growled and crashed their lips together, and now Duo responded with fervent passion, the wicked tongue darting into Remy's mouth and flickering across the inside of his lips. Blood sprang from the tiny clashes of teeth on flesh, and they swallowed each other's essences down greedily. Remy understood now; understood that Duo didn't want sweetness and light, didn't want gentle kisses and cuddling. He wanted rage and darkness, blood and fire, snarling clashes for dominance, because the pain of rage and blood could erase the profound despair inside him.

Duo made a muffled sound and jerked away, throat arching, allowing Remy to see the blood thrum through the dark veins. Breathing hard, they rested, Duo absently tracing abstract shapes at the small of Remy's back. Duo sighed, then. "That was better." The quirk of a lip. "Don't worry. You'll get plenty of chances to practice."

* * *

Wufei knelt before a tree in the small forest on the Institute grounds under a cold and clouded gray sky, sketching out kanji on the rice paper he had set before him. 'Meiran, Meiran,' his heart cried, 'Why did you leave me?' Quietly, he finished the haiku, and looked it over again.

_My wife, my lover._

_A sakura blossom fallen before your time._

_The stars weep today._

Dipping the tip of his brush in the ink, he sketched out his name and then put his tools away briskly, fixing the paper to the ground with a rock. Turning, he picked up the samisen at his side and plucked the strings, uncaring of the few tears that escaped his rigid control.

The soft, sad strains of the Ashokan Farewell drifted through the silent forest, disturbing none. Wufei continued to play, and said calmly,

"I know you're there, Pietro." He heard snow crackle behind him but refused to turn. Anger swelled in his chest, but just as quickly was gone. Today was not a day to be angry with anyone other then himself.

The last note vibrated, quivered in his heart and head and hands, and then faded. Wufei put the samisen back in its case, and finally turned to look at Pietro. His white hair and clothes blended perfectly into the background of snow, an utter contrast to his own somber gray clothing.

Black and white facing off across a placid empty space at the end of the world. A shadow and its reflection. Wufei stared steadily into the light blue eyes, tired, tired of hate and terrible love and loss.

The eyes blinked, and Pietro spoke.

"I didn't know you were married." Wufei said nothing, unsurprised that the other mutant was able to read kanji. The man was astoundingly intelligent, able to speak so many languages as to make him feel like a child. "Yes. Her name was Meiran. She died in a battle against the forces of the ESA."

Pietro moved then, walking with quick, measured steps over to him. "I'm sure I would have liked to meet her." Wufei stared at his hands, flexing his fingers. White flame burst from his fingertips, racing along the snow-covered ground and making the earth hiss with steam. "If I had known," Wufei felt his words grow ragged, "If- if I had just known that I could _do _this, I could have- I could have saved them all. I could have ended the war and not ended up betraying my friends and nearly killing Heero and-"

Tears streamed, unbidden and unceasing, from his tightly clenched eyes, hands curling into fists. His eyes snapped open as he felt a cold, thin hand gently wipe away the tears freezing on his cheeks. Sky-blue eyes stared into his, and then Pietro drew him to him, arms wrapping around his thin frame.

Shadow and reflection melded. Wufei stood stiffly in the circle of Pietro's arms for a moment, and then, with a great and shuddering groan of grief and agony and bone-deep apology to Nataku, slumped forward, resting his head on Pietro's shoulder, feeling the long-delayed sobs thunder through his body.

Pietro whispered nonsensical words of comfort to him, as snow fell softly around them, water melding with the flames that shielded the two broken souls from the world around.

* * *

Heero sat on the couch with Logan, staring at the hockey game on the television without seeing it. Frivolous entertainment. The spectators seemed so joyful at seeing blood, without knowing that blood was death, seeming like spectators at gladiatorial games where men butchered and slaughtered their kindred.

"Tell me about this J guy." Heero heard the undercurrent of steel in the voice, and, hating himself for complying, obeyed.

"J was… not a evil man. He didn't treat me cruelly, or-"

"Bullshit." The tone brooked no argument. "Tell me about him, with no excuses this time." Heero stared at his hands, feeling the cold gundanium rods within them, and sighed, closing his eyes. The burly arm wrapped around his shoulders tightened, drawing him closer. Heero rested for a moment, absorbing warmth and strength from this remarkable man that seemed to have an undying supply of both.

"J took care of me since I was born. Until I was seven, I stayed with a man named Odin Lowe, who taught me to kill." His voice was bleak. "Odin and I were never friends. He was paid highly by J to prepare me to fight for the freedom of the colonies, and so he saw me as a means to gain money. One of the things J wanted me to experience was nonconsensual intercourse," 'Weak,' he thought distantly, 'You can't even say the word 'rape',' "and Odin initiated me in that, although he did not like it and only performed the duty twice." He registered Logan's unceasing growls, and said curiously,

"Why are you angry?"

"_No one_ should have to go through that, least of all a child!" Heero opened his eyes and stared at the television once more, unseeing. "You are forgetting, Logan, that I never was a child. From the moment I was born, my life and my body were consigned to the cause of freedom. I did not know anything different. I thought that it was normal for five-year old children to know how to incapacitate grown men in thirty different ways, or to carry out assassinations. I thought that it was normal for seven-year olds to be thrown into cells with pedophiles to see whether or not they could fight back."

"What happened to him?"

"He was killed. Duo was very angry, because he wanted to kill him himself. It was good that he did not."

"Why?"

Heero smiled thinly. "Because if Duo had done so, I would have had to kill him." He shifted as Logan pulled him to straddle the older man's legs and turned him around, whiskey-brown eyes gazing into his own.

"You're safe now. You don't have to kill anyone, here." Heero let his head rest on Logan's flannel-covered shoulder, feeling the man's fingers thread gently through his hair.

"But killing is all that I can do," he whispered. Logan sighed, warm breath stirring down his neck. "I know. It's all I can do, too." Heero tightened his arms around Logan's chest, hiding his face from the world, in the only place he ever felt right.

* * *

/Promise me you'll be back soon/ Trowa's voice was plaintive, even over the phone. Quatre smiled, hefting the bags heavy with textbooks.

"Of course, love. I just need to get the textbooks for next semester's Philosophy course. Were there any books you wanted?"

/Could you get me a copy of _The Lions of Al-Rassan?_/

"Sure."

/I love you./

"And I, you." Quatre shut the cell phone and slipped it into his pocket, entering the bookstore. Zero murmured a low warning in his head. Quatre closed his eyes for a moment in weariness, sending a quick pulse of warning to Trowa and the others before he opened them, moving quickly into the rows of bookshelves.

Footsteps, admirably quiet (but not quiet enough to escape the notice of a Gundam pilot) followed him. Approximately five, maybe six. Quatre cursed mentally; normally he could take out all of them, but in such a closed and public space, the chances were slim. He glanced behind him, scanning past the rows of poetry to where the shadows moved swiftly.

He stepped up the pace, moving past the fantasy section and into the science. A man stepped out in front of him, dressed in black, cold, pitiless eyes roaming over him. Quatre stopped, hand going surreptiously to where he concealed his gun.

"That would be inadvisable." The voice was as cold and flat as the eyes. Quatre shrugged mentally. It didn't matter if he was captured. He had escaped much tougher opponents then these before; he could do it again.

"I don't suppose there's anything I can say in order to survive?" The man said nothing. Quatre sighed. "I figured as much." He closed his eyes as the sharp pinprick of a dart raced across his neck, feeling the burn of tranquilizers pumping through his system.

Quatre Raberba Winner, Gundam pilot and beloved of Trowa Barton, fell quietly into oblivion.

* * *

As the ragged girl named X 23 staggered, bleeding, through the snowy woods to collapse on the mansion's porch, as Quatre Winner was dragged out of the bookstore with the excuse to the cashier that he was a narcoleptic and simply needed rest, as Trowa Barton howled his anger and agony, fur slashing across his skin, as snow fell silently to the earth, the sun touched the rim of the earth and began to sink. 


	15. Subtraction

'_And all I ever learned from love_

_Was how to shoot someone who outdrew you.'_

- 'Hallelujah' by Jeff Buckley

Heero's head snapped up as he heard Trowa's agonized cry, leaping from Logan's arms to skid into the hallway, narrowly avoiding colliding with Rogue. Duo came up the hallway, loading his gun with perfect, clean movements, glancing once, sadly, at Rogue, before he followed Heero up the stairs. They met Wufei at the top of the stairs, and Heero noticed the thin, bloodless line of his lips with apprehension.

This was bad, then. He took a breath and squared his shoulders, opening the door to their room.

Trowa lay in the fetal position in the corner, golden fur rippling up and down his body, thin form shaking with the ceaseless wailing that dripped, unheeded, from bleeding lips. Their room was in shambles; thick claw marks raked over every available surface, golden tufts of fur, crimson-stained, littering the floor. Duo's Lamb of God and Manson posters hung bravely onto the wall, ripped into pieces by the mateless lion.

Duo dropped to his knees beside Trowa, hauling the larger frame into his lap. Trowa didn't resist, and indeed seemed boneless with shock.

"Trowa? Tro?" Duo's voice was ragged with fright, worse with each word. "Trowa? Trowa, wake up!" Wufei sat beside him, fingers combing through the dark hair, as he said,

"I don't think he can hear you, Duo." Trowa shivered, the horrible keening going on and on and on-

It was suddenly cut off, and his blank eyes slid closed. Heero was across the room in a moment, twisted claws held to Jean's pulsing jugular.

"What did you do to him?" Jean stuttered, Scott's hands went to the visor- Wufei immediately had a gun trained on him- and Heero's claws pressed closer, staring into the green eyes dilated with terror. Skin cells split beneath the pressure, interrupting mitosis and replacing it with torn and dying cells, capillaries cracking open and the liquid life trickling from the wound.

"I just- I- I made him sleep!" Her voice cracked upward, and Heero was satisfied. He spun away and crouched at Trowa's side, cupping the thin face in his hands, thumb stroking over the sharp angles of cheekbones. He felt Logan's callused hand land on his shoulder, squeezing once. Heero leaned into the touch, wanting to escape the throbbing void in his chest where Quatre's presence had been.

"Logan. Where is Xavier?"

"He's talking to- holy shit!"

"Tell me." Duo was breathing in sharp, hitching gasps, each breath seeming to be ripped bodily from him. "Her name is X23," Logan said. "She's a female clone of me, created to be a weapon. A few years younger then you." Heero tensed. "She's escaped from a man named Trask. Scott, tell them who Trask is. I have to go deal with X23." Heero grasped Logan's hand momentarily, and then turned back to Trowa.   
"Trask is the leader of the Friends of Humanity. He wants to destroy all mutants, and he has the money and resources to do so. He captures mutants and puts them in camps, or performs experiments on them." Heero listened with half an ear.

Someone screamed outside, and Trowa's eyes snapped open. He breathed,

"Quatre." And then he was up and running, golden fur slashing across his skin as he flowed into the form of a lion, mane flowing behind him. The others followed, but Trowa left them behind, leaping out of the mansion and running, grace given form, across the snowy yard to the gates, where a small group had gathered.

Heero followed, legs pushing against the ground as he sucked in great gouts of air, trying to prevent Trowa from seeing this _perversion_, this colder-then-ice blade that hewed their hearts from them-

He stopped, sparing not a glance for Jamie, dry-heaving near him, and stared up at the gates, aching to reach for Trowa, who sat, still as death, at his knees, now human.

A blond head, sunlight hair encrusted with stiff brown, faced toward the darkening sky, the stump of the neck impaled upon the points of the gate. Aquamarine eyes gazed blankly down towards them, the gray fog of death having not encroached upon them yet. Blood, fresh and coppery-smelling, trickled down the cold iron, steaming softly in the freezing air.

Trowa's scream was so loud that it shattered the windows.

* * *

Duo howled with black rage, wings of shadow stretching out to encompass the Institute.

"What the FUCK is wrong with the world! It's not enough that we gave up our sanity and our innocence and every goddamn bit of life we had: now we have to lose Quatre!" He fell to his knees, and pounded his fists into the ground, uncaring of the loud splintering of bones and knuckles, the blood that ran from where the nails had pulled free.

"We didn't ask for this! We didn't ask for anything more then death!" He looked up, seeing Rogue staring at him with a kind of horrified pity in her eyes. "This isn't our fight!" he screamed brokenly at her. "You fucking hypocrites! You can't even fight your own goddamn battles!"

She came closer, and Duo scrambled away.

"Duo?"

"Don't- don't touch me," he said. "I just want to help," she said miserably, careful not to look at the macabre spectacle above them. Jean and Scott were shepherding the gathered people away, leaving Rogue, Logan, Wufei, Heero, and Duo to comfort Trowa.

"You didn't want to help me when I needed you most!" he spat, each word dripping with enough venom to kill. "I know!" she yelled back, trying to override the blind hatred in his voice. "I- I-" her breath hitched in her chest, "I know, _God, I know_! I'm sorry! _I'm so, so sorry_, but I can't do anything!"

"Goddamn you!" Rogue burst into tears at his hissed words and threw herself forward, wrapping her arms around his neck. Duo crushed her thin body to himself, murmuring into her smoke-scented hair. "I don't understand," he murmured, "We- we saved our colonies! We saved the world twice over, but it's not enough! Why- _why isn't it enough?_" he said, his voice exhausted and cracking with sorrow.

"I don't know. I don't know." They rocked together in the snow, and Duo cried bitter tears that froze as soon as they hit Rogue's poison skin. 'Just for a while,' Duo thought, rage lighting a roaring flame in his heart, 'Just for these small minutes, let me indulge in grief.'

* * *

Heero stared helplessly at Trowa, who sat, broken, at his feet, Quatre's head cradled in his arms as he murmured softly to it.

"Oh, love, we'll be fine. I've got you, and no one will ever hurt you again, because you're mine and I'm yours, and that's all I ever needed to know," he crooned. "My love, my Quatre." His voice cracked as he ran a pale hand over crusted skin, palming the eyelids shut, covering the gray gaze.

Heero knelt at Trowa's side and held his arms out, sliding out of his shirt.

"M-may I see him?" Trowa closed his eyes, passing the head over. Heero swallowed as he wrapped it in the cloth shirt, feeling a foreign scream welling in his throat, even as he fought it down.

Trowa, now splintered and shattered open, his traumatized spirit laid out for everyone to see, had no such compunctions.

He threw his head back and wailed, the sound tearing from his throat with a raw and liquid sound, the noise of blood and tears intermingled. The wail morphed into a raging roar, and from there into an unholy, wet crackling scream of grief, somewhere between the whimpers of an animal caught in a trap, the laughter of a madman, and the sobbing of a widow.

Heero held Quatre to him, eyes clenched shut as he fought against the tears. Wufei caressed the limp lock of blond hair, cold anger firming his brow and hardening his eyes. Duo sobbed ceaselessly onto Rogue's shoulder.

Trowa continued to scream.

* * *

"How are they?"

"See for yourself." Jubilee moved aside so that Bobby could look in through the window to the garage. "How's Jamie?" she asked, shooting out a few sparks idly. "Completely screwed up, the poor kid. He can't stop crying; Beast had to give him a sedative."

"I'm not surprised," she said grimly. "How long have they been like that?" Bobby said, his voice hushed. "Couple hours." She knew what she would see, were she to look in the window. They were all holding each other, the- ewww!- head nestled between them, their eyes as cold as winter and as sharp as steel.

"They're saying something, now!" Bobby bounced at her side, staring. Jubilee moved to stare avidly in through the frosted windowpane, gazing at the cold, sorrowful group, lying among the rusty bikes, Logan's motorcycle, and Scott's cherry-red convertible.

The shadow-controller- Duo?- moved sluggishly, and finally said,

"We can't die yet."

"No." Heero, now. "We will stay. We will fight, we will kill, and we will die. This is not our fight, but it was brought to us. We can't abandon it yet. When we've fought, when we've killed Quatre's killers, when we're done, when it's all over…"

"Then we can die," Trowa said, his voice shattered and hoarse from the screaming- they had only made him stop by giving him the head back-, his teeth bared, wolflike. Duo sighed.

"Look at us. We won a war, and now we're fighting another. We were the Lost Generation at home, the generation that had been butchered and damned, and now these fucking _children_ are going to become their own Lost Generation."

Heero shrugged listlessly. "Then they will be tempered into adults, or fall. There is nothing we can do about that."

Jubilee, watching from the window, her breath steaming on the windowpane and snow falling around her, shivered.

* * *

Trowa stood before the pyre tree, gazing up at the cold sky, purple as a spreading bruise, with branches dark as veins slashing through it. There was a cold within him, a freezing void empty as space and colder then winter. His arms tightened around the precious burden in his arms, fingers stroking the golden hair. He had washed the blood from his lover's hair, wrapped the bleeding neck in gauze, and covered him in a silken cloth, in preparation.

Duo finished pouring gasoline on the wood, the clear fluid running off the wood and soaking into the snow. Normally, wood-burning fires weren't hot enough to cremate bodies; however, when you had a fire-controller on your side…

"It's ready," Duo said softly. Trowa drew back the cloth and stared at the pale, well-beloved face, the pink lips that had been so bitable- the eyes that had been warmth and light in a world of cold and shadow- the face that had been love. He lowered his head and touched lips to lips, his own bodily warmth sucked up by the cold of death. Fleetingly, he remembered a line from a play called Salome that he had seen performed in Vienna.

_'Ah! I have kissed your mouth, Iokanaan, I have kissed your mouth. Your lips had a bitter taste. Was it the taste of blood?...Perhaps it was the taste of love. They say that love has a bitter taste… But what does it matter? What does it matter? I have kissed your mouth, Iokanaan, I have kissed your mouth.'_

But he tasted neither blood nor love, only cold death. Softly, he drew away, and gazed with cold eyes on the pyre. Pulling the cloth back to hide Quatre, he laid him on the pyre and stepped away.

'There is nothing I can do.' Closing his eyes, he nodded to Wufei.

Flame as orange as a dragon's eye sprang from nothing, roaring and thundering as it sucked oxygen into itself, leaping into the sky. Red light flickered around them, reflecting off the snow and seeming to make the land look as though it was soaked in blood. Heero and Duo were standing close together, facing outward and guarding them. Wufei trembled with the effort of keeping the fire at such a high temperature, the flames changing hues to a white as pale as stars.

Trowa stared at the dark shape within the flames, watching the golden hair catch fire and curl tightly, limned in light for a moment, the skin char and blacken, sloughing off the high cheekbones he had loved to stroke, the perfect nose he had loved to bite playfully.

The warmth of the flames didn't touch him, a cold, desolate figure standing alone before the fire. Quatre's skull cracked, held- still as ice- and then crumbled in a cloud of dust. Wufei sighed hoarsely, lowering his hands as the fire subsided, becoming orange once more, and then disappeared.

A tearing sob caught in Trowa's throat as he fell to his knees, digging his fingers into the mud formed by the melted snow. He began to cry, helpless, useless to save his lover, helpless to bring the one he loved more then life itself back.

'There is nothing I can do.'

'Nothing…'

* * *

Heero twirled the knife in his fingers, the blade sending spangles of light across the room. Trowa perched on the corner of the couch, Quatre's gun and javelins slung across his back. He felt Logan's arm tighten around his shoulders, and he leaned into his side, staring unseeingly at the slender brunette girl in front of them. Wrapped in a tattered robe, with a cup of hot chocolate clenched in frozen hands, she spoke in a rusty tone, as though her voice was mostly unused.

"Trask has a nuclear warhead. He will attempt to detonate it soon; I am unaware of the precise time. I do know that he wishes to destroy all of Bayville; of course, the nuclear fallout will be significant, and it will destroy New York City as well as the surrounding area."

Heero almost smiled: it was almost as if they (Logan, him, and this X 23) were a family of sorts, united by a legacy of pain and metal. But no matter.

"Was it Trask who killed Quatre?" Duo was cold and focused, his face bloodless with rage and anticipation. Wufei and the odd white-haired boy were tightly entwined, hands clutching each other.

X 23 inclined her head regally.

"It fits his methods." Duo grinned wolfishly. "Excellent. Your goals and ours align, then." Xavier moved, his wheelchair whirring as he turned to face them.

"We have to have a plan. We'll divide into three groups: one to find the plane and take it down, one to find Trask and capture him, and one to free all the mutants kept there. Remember, we _must not_ kill. To do so makes us little better then the ones we fight."

His eyes flickered significantly to the pilots. Heero felt a low snicker rumble through the chest behind him, and said dryly,

"Indeed. Let us leave them alive and humiliated, so that they may regroup and attempt to kill us again." The Professor stared at him. Rogue moved restlessly.

"I concur."

"Rogue! Do you _want_ to become a killer?" That was Jean, sounding scandalized. "Of course not! How could you want to do something like that, especially when you've seen what… it…" she trailed off apologetically.

"What it did to us?" Duo said with a grim smile. "Yes." Duo smiled at her, and then turned his attention back to the Professor. "We are going to kill Trask, You cannot stop us, and any attempt to do so will lose you any chance at our help, which you need."

"Why?" Wufei let out a harsh bark of laughter, startling everyone.

"Are you a fool, or just naïve? We have experience in covert operations, experience in hacking and explosives, not to mention we are the only ones here ruthless enough to kill with surety. Without us, you will be butchered. I cannot say I am happy with the fact that there will be others along, but I suppose you deem it necessary."

"But-" Duo exploded,

"You're fighting a _goddamn war!_ Did you possibly think there weren't going to be casualties! You fucking idiots! You fight or you die! There is no other choice." His voice softened, becoming laden with sorrow. "You are tempered into a weapon, or collapse under the pressure. _God_, did you think that we like killing? No, we hate it, we hated every goddamned hellish second of it, but we'd do it all over again, because _It. Was. Necessary._"

Xavier pressed his fingertips to his forehead. "Very well. You five have permission to kill." Duo's lips peeled back from his teeth in a feral snarl. "We don't need your fucking permission."

* * *

Logan stared at the small, desolate figure standing on the edge of the cliff, dark hair whipping about in the cold wind. There was a gleam of moonlight on metal, and he could see the grave, cold blue eyes in the twisted reflection off Heero's claws.

He came up behind Heero, and wrapped his arms around the slender shoulders. Heero retracted his claws and leaned into him, glancing upward. Logan gazed at him, saying nothing.

"Trowa will die tomorrow."

_We might all die._ That knowledge hung between them, unspoken, even as Logan tightened his grip, wanting to hold this diamond-brittle-and-hard young man to him forever, keeping him safe from the specter of battle and nuclear apocalypse before them. Logan looked out at the lights of Bayville, stretched out beneath them like grains of sand strewn across a black blanket.

"Logan?" He looked down, and froze at the quiet, heartbreaking half-smile Heero was giving him, his voice softer then normal, almost unable to force the words out. "Would you kiss me? I'd like to know what it's like, in case I-" Logan cut him off ruthlessly, stooping swiftly and sealing his lips over Heero's. Thick fingers tangled in Heero's hair, tilting his head back.

He tasted like smoke, leather, and blood. Like sin.

Logan liked it. He felt slender, callused fingers slide up his back, locking around his ribs, the inherent, _wrong-wrong-wrong_ strength in them gentled, pulled back for him. He growled into the open mouth beneath him, tongue twisting to tangle with Heero's. Blue eyes drifted shut, and he wrapped his free arm around the slender hips, lifting and settling the long limbs around him as he backed up, letting Heero rest his weight on the Harley he had given Logan.

He ground his hips forward, meeting a matching hardness, and laughed hoarsely, separating their mouths. "Nice to know I've still got it, kid." Heero smirked with kiss-swollen lips and craned his head, staring at the rising sun. Logan dove forward again, hand insinuating itself under Heero's shirt, running across scars.

Heero shuddered and hissed into his mouth, arms locking even tighter.

"Hey, lovebirds!" Duo's brazen voice rang out from where he sat astride his own bike. "We've got to get suited up. You can finish that later! We'll be doing the same, huh?" He grinned at Remy, sitting behind him, who looked green.

"Sure. Sure, mon ami. Please don't go so fast, next time."

Logan felt his happiness melt away like snow before a flame.

_There might not be a next time. For any of us._


	16. Into The Dark

'_If there's no one beside you_

_When your soul embarks_

_Then I'll follow you into the dark_

_Then I'll follow you into the dark'_

- 'I Will Follow You Into The Dark' by Death Cab for Cutie

* * *

There was no sound.

Trowa stared at the side of the plane cabin, fingers absentmindedly loading bullets, one after another, into the clips. Sunlight striped the walls from the window, dust motes dancing eternally in the shafts of Quatre's hair. Click. Click.

Sound burst back into being, and the soft whispers of Duo's and Remy's conversation washed over him as a tide, and Heero sighed, tremulous and tender as Quatre's smile, from the back of the plane. He glanced back, seeing Logan bent over the thin, compact form, fingers feathering over the ridges of ribs, hungry mouth latched onto the side of his erstwhile leader's neck. Storm said nothing from where she was piloting the plane, X 23 perched beside her.

"Charles said that they've contacted the plane carrying the bomb. There are several fleets of Sentinels protecting it, though." Trowa set the gun aside, ignoring Storm's words, and began to oil the mechanisms of Quatre's javelins, treating it with all the care he had lavished on his lover during life.

The pain of love was gone now, obliterated in the wave of cold, focused intent. X 23 said something, pointing. The plane shuddered, shook like Quatre in the throes of climax, and began to descend.

Trowa smiled.

* * *

Bobby McWilliams was a compassionate man. One had to be hard to ignore the sounds of the mutants pleading, the crying of mutant children ripped from their mothers' breasts, and McWilliams was not. He was the only ally the mutants had, and he performed his job with all the focus and drive he had lavished on the destruction of the Viet Cong that had taken his arm.

"Sorry, Scope." He smiled apologetically. "I can't get the collar off you now; don't have the keys yet. I can get you some ice cream from the mess, if you like?" The little girl, her pure white eyes gazing at him, nodded.

"I want icy!" McWilliams laughed, ruffling her straw-blonde hair with the prosthetic arm Trask had shelled out a couple hundred grand for.

"Well, I'll get one for you, and you can share it with the newbie back there, huh?" The boy huddled in the corner of the concrete room twitched as McWilliams's gaze landed on him, and said, his voice rough from screaming,

"There's something coming. Something… bad for Trask, good for us."

"What about me?" The boy regarded him solemnly. "I… I can't tell." McWilliams heard the lie, but dismissed it, going back out to the center of the compound, where a few frightened recruits milled about aimlessly. "Hey, get back in the barracks, kids," McWilliams urged, using his mild, fatherly aura to best effect. A few of them flashed quick, zealous smiles, and hurried into the low-slung building. McWilliams stared up at the sapphire-blue Nevada sky, searching.

A black streak roared overhead, banked, and came back, shrugging off the automatic weapons fire with ease. The jet began to land, and clouds boiled out of nothingness, covering the previously clear sky. Soldiers clustered behind him, semi-automatic weapons aimed at the door.

The door opened. Flame burst from within, and a thin, lean silhouette appeared in the fire, lone green eye burning with fire hotter then the one without. Shadows crawled from beneath the plane, morphed, stretched, and twisted into hunched, leering shapes, shambling forward as though just learning how to walk. A rank of men fell behind him like puppets without strings.

The green-eyed man leaped forward, eerily silent, and McWilliams felt a cruel, cold hand tighten around his throat. He scrabbled at the harsh grip, which suddenly twisted, a bright shoot of pain flowering from the broken vertebrae.

Click.

McWilliams slipped into shadow.

Logan was a hardened man, a hard drinker and lover. He had thought himself inured to all violence, all blood and sickness.

This, however, was a new kind of sickness, a pervading, awesome sense of _wrong_, of contagion spreading and blackening everything it touched. The four remaining pilots moved in eerie synchronicity, their movements coordinated and calculated. Or as calculated as they could be.

During the pilots' infrequent visits to the Danger Room, their movements had been graceful, cold and spare. But this- Logan ducked as a spray of blood spattered across his uniform from a man whose own shadow was crawling over his skin, choking and ripping- this was sheer brutality.

There was no grace, no precision. They moved silently, Heero disdaining the weapons he had packed in favor of using his hands- those hands ripped the jaw off a young man and, turning, he ripped the head off another- while Trowa impaled several on his lover's javelins and kicked them off, watching with dispassionate eyes as their guts spilled out. A few burst into flame from within and were consumed, screaming for mercy.

There was none given.

Men's own shadows, given life, crawled onto them and tore them to pieces before flying to Duo's side, joining the wings of shadow that encompassed the open space that was now gleaming with blood. Logan and Storm stood silently off to the side, Remy and X 23 having left to free the prisoners, and watched, Storm's hand over her mouth as she fought to keep from heaving.

A golden lion burst from the roiling mass of black-suited soldiers and roared, the noise sounding like the voice of Hell itself. It shook its blood-dyed mane and leaped back into the fray, glorying in its battle against the new soldiers pouring into the compound. Logan closed his eyes against the sight of limbs, torn from their sockets, spinning freely in the air, and wished that he could close his ears against the wet cracking noises of bones shattering, the _schloop-schloop-schloop_ of lungs and hearts thrashing in the open, the screams of the wounded and dying.

Semi-automatic weapons fired wildly, their bullets zinging through the air, only to meet Wufei's flames and melt in mid-air. A kid screamed from the entrance to the cages.

"What's happening!" _Shit!_

"Storm, go tell the Cajun and 23 to get those kids back inside, now! They don't need to see this." The woman, glad to escape the carnage, nodded and hurried away. Logan turned back to the grim spectacle, staring at the red tide that was even now lapping thirstily at the toes of his boots. As if from a great distance, he heard Duo's voice, high-pitched in denial and pain.

"_Trowa!_" The golden lion roared in shock and agony, the sound piercing. Logan steeled himself and waded into the mess, unable to understand why he couldn't find the massive feline. It was gold- easy to see- so why couldn't he find it?

Oh. That was why.

The lion's fur was no longer gold- now it was a sick brown, an earthy color that was yet unlike mud, its own special hue of rotted blood and decay. 'The amount of blood needed to cover him…' Blood dripped from each strand of the dark mane, blood ran like tears from the intelligent green eyes, blood streamed from the gaping hole in the beast's side.

The lion limped to the jet, shifting on the way so that it was Trowa Barton, skin painted with crimson and hair matted, knotted and dripping blood, clothes black with gore, who lay in the shadow of the plane. A shadow flew from Duo's wings to cover the wound and hold the blood within.

"You gonna be okay?" Trowa glanced at him and then nodded.

"Yes. I only need to live long enough to see Trask." Logan turned back to the fight, leaping in to take Trowa's place. Snarling wordlessly, the animal within lending its strength and knowledge, he fought his way through the swirling chaos, to stand back-to-back with Heero, feeling his claws slice easily through flesh until they reached bone; a bit of pressure- he was through, and the limbs fell to lie at his feet. There were a few balls of white light, the life that Heero stole, floating through the air to be absorbed into his lover's outstretched hands, lighting the dark, artificial night. 'The lucky ones…'

Someone screamed the order to retreat, and the black-suited soldiers fell back like a receding tide, leaving the wounded and dying behind. Duo, panting, limped over to them, his feet squelching every so often when he stepped on an internal organ made external. Wufei followed, cuts seaming his face and bullet wounds on his back seeping blood.

Logan glanced back at the jet, making sure that the last of the captives had hurried inside, before he nodded to Wufei. Wufei smiled, flames dancing in his eyes. He stretched his arms out, and fire burst from his fingertips, racing through the air with thundering roars. The fire leaped onto the buildings, twining around the wood and cement, burning hot enough to cook the air itself, and from there it expanded, melting concrete and splintering wood.

Wufei stared at the burning buildings with a strange sort of serenity on his face. Heero turned, grunted a few orders, and loped towards the only building that wasn't burning: the fireproof, bombproof bunker that Trask would be hiding in. The dark wings attached to Duo's shoulders flapped once, gently, and then collapsed on themselves, forming into a scythe, which Duo slung over his shoulders, hooking his elbows over it. Whistling, he strolled after Heero, braid flirting in the breeze made by the fire.

Wufei glanced at Logan, and Logan felt his heart freeze in his chest. There was nothing but hatred in those eyes, in the eyes of all of the pilots. A cold, remorseless, vicious hatred to those who hurt their own, hatred that went on and on and on until there was nothing left, hatred without bounds, without reason.

Sick at heart, Logan watched as Wufei turned and followed the other two into the bunker where Trask was hiding, uncaring of the fires that burned and twisted into the cloudy sky, melting concrete. There was a cracking, and one of the barracks fell. He looked at Trowa, who sat with one hand pressed to the wound, holding the shadow bandage on, blood seeping between his fingers, head tilted back and a cruel smile on his lips.

Then the screaming started.

* * *

Logan finished talking to Chuck, and turned to see the pilots, grim expressions on their faces, dragging a squirming Trask into the compound. 'Oh, _no.'_

"Chuck, get the others into the plane."

"But they'll want to congratulate themselves on disarming-"

"Just do it! They don't want, or need, to see this." Trowa heaved himself to his feet, and limped over, holding four javelins in his hand. Chuck wheeled himself away quickly, herding Rogue and the others into the Jet. Logan glanced up, and sighed when he saw all of the X-men, noses pressed to the windows, watching avidly.

Trask screamed, and he turned back to see one of the javelins impaling the man's wrist, blood spreading, and he heard the noise of bone against metal as the man writhed. Another javelin, then two more, and Trask was spread-eagled, staked out under the merciless light of the sun, Storm having dissipated the storm clouds.

Heero knelt and injected a red liquid into the man's neck. "What is he doing?" Chuck sounded curious. "He's injecting him with his own blood, to keep him alive longer." His voice sounded distorted and flat even to his own ears. Trowa straddled Trask's chest, and lifted a razor to the man's face. The blade glinted, and Logan could hear Trask's pleading from where he stood.

The blade flickered, and Logan closed his ears against Trask's scream. Heero and the others walked over to where the two stood, immobile and fascinated. Logan wanted to howl his disgust, to ask Heero 'why?' And then his lover looked up at him, and he saw sanity returning to the blue gaze. Sanity, and horrible, crushing regret, filled with dark memories.

Logan opened his arms, and Heero came willingly, allowing the older man to hold him so tightly that Logan half-thought he heard Heero's bones creak. He sniffed, smelling blood and sweat, focusing on that familiar scent, but he could still hear Trowa working relentlessly, hear the people in the plane vomiting.

Time passed. The sun sank in the sky; Trask's screams died away to muffled moaning, and then to nothing at all. Trowa wasn't satisfied, although Trask had lost everything that made him human. The nose had been first to go, followed by the ears, then the fingers and toes, and now Trowa was methodically slicing the man's lips off. Blood stained the ground.

The sun began to disappear behind the horizon. Logan shushed his fragile lover, who was shaking in his arms, memories of similar tortures overtaking him, and stared at the pitiful spectacle.

Trowa was speaking now, his voice eerily calm and soft, as though he was discussing nothing more then the weather.

"It's surprising how fragile the human body really is. The eyes are but sacks of fluid surrounded by membrane; a little bit of pressure from fingers, and they burst." Trask's back arched as Trowa demonstrated. Logan could hear the sick noise from where he stood. Trowa continued, dispassionate. "The belly is nothing but meat; it breaks easily beneath one's hands." He dug into Trask's stomach, and steam gushed into the cold air. "And all that remains is to push your hand in and tug-" Trowa twisted his arm, and the man went from writhing to stiff as a board within a second. "-and you can learn how easily you can die." Bloody things slipped out to splat, wetly, onto the ground. Trowa's lip twitched, and he spat into the ruin of Trask's face.

Logan could hear the ragged breaths and heartbeat, the pause between each one growing ever longer.

And then, finally, there were no more breaths or heartbeat, and it was all pause.

Trowa threw his head back and stared at the sky, and Logan could smell the saltwater smell of tears, could see the shine of tear tracks trailing across the fine-boned features. Trowa's head turned, and the green eyes, swimming with tears, met his, before flickering over to Duo, who stood, wrapped in Remy's embrace.

"Take it off," he demanded. Duo nodded, gesturing. The shadow bandage twisted, shrunk, and was gone, allowing Trowa's blood to spill forth, dark red and thick: arterial blood. 'His arteries are torn?' Logan's respect for Trowa reached a new height. It was obvious that the man had been clinging to life through his hatred and sheer will alone; most people would have been dead within five minutes, if not less.

Trowa slumped forward, rolling off Trask's body to sprawl on the concrete, Trask's blood mingling with his own. The remaining pilots trudged over to him and knelt in the spreading pool of blood.

"Why is he dying? He doesn't have to die!" Rogue's voice was rising rapidly into hysteria. Logan looked up and saw all of the X-men had left the plane, most of them looking pale, sweaty, and nauseous.

"He's dying because he loved Quatre too much," he explained, embarrassed at having to talk about love. "He was only living to kill Trask, and now that he's done, he can die." Rogue began to cry, her nose becoming bright red. Logan wrapped an arm around her shoulders awkwardly, glancing over at the sad sight once more.

They were saying something, so softly he couldn't hear it. Duo laughed, and grasped Trowa's hand, pressing something into it. Heero murmured something, and Wufei retorted. Logan was reminded, for a moment, of how they had found these men in a way much like this one, gathered to say goodbye to one of their own. And now they were doing it again, only this time for good.

Trowa's chest rose; one bloodstained hand stretched up to the darkening sky; the hand fell limply back to earth, and the last breath of life in Trowa Barton rushed up to join the heavens.

Duo made an awful, choking noise, and threw himself on top of the still corpse, pressing his face into the neck that no longer had a pulse. Wufei did nothing for a moment, got up and sat down helplessly, and settled for rage, flames appearing in the air in answer to their master's grief, flames that outshone the appearing stars, flames as relentless as a black hole and as bright as the sun. Heero said nothing, did nothing.

Dimly, as if from a great distance, Logan heard Rogue's tears, heard Kitty's sniffles, heard Kurt's rosary clicking as he murmured his prayers for the dying.

And so, nearly twenty-four hours to the day, Trowa Barton joined his lover in death, satisfied that he had wreaked his vengeance.

* * *

_Some Time Later…_

"You're lucky, Kurt," Rogue said. "You're not rooming next to two nymphomaniacs who think that the answer to all nightmares is to have sex, very loudly and for as long as possible." The bed in the room next to hers squeaked loudly and banged on the wall for emphasis. Rogue rolled her eyes as Duo's moans and Remy's deep voice, speaking French with a smug tone, drifted through the walls.

"I thought the Professor did not allow lovers to room together?" Kurt said curiously. Rogue smirked. "I thought so, too, until Duo told me that he threatened him with Trask's fate if he tried to separate them. Apparently, Logan and Heero concurred."

"Ah," Kurt said wryly, "those two. They're not- how do you say?- nymphomaniacs, but they are always fighting. Always! I cannot sleep for them destroying helpless furniture. And when they are done fighting, they, too, have sex. I did not think that Logan would take such delight in 'teaching.' He certainly doesn't enjoy teaching us to defend ourselves."

Rogue sobered at that. "He doesn't like to go near the 'pyre tree', you know that."

"I would not," Kurt agreed. "The pilots are always there, talking to them. Wufei once nearly attacked Jamie for intruding."

"I think Jamie wished Wufei had succeeded when he saw what Pietro had planned for him."

"Pietro is rather protective, yes. I think he is very frightened of losing the one person who tolerates his need for reassurance. Wufei needs someone to protect, and Pietro needs to feel safe, so it works."

"Not always," Rogue warned. "They still have flashbacks. Heero broke Duncan's legs when Duncan touched him when he was stuck in a flashback. Logan, Remy, and Pietro can't always be there to bring them out of the flashbacks."

"It is better then the alternative. They would still be extraordinarily dangerous without the others to stabilize them," Kurt pointed out.

"True." Duo cursed, very loudly and fluently, from the next room. "Goddamnit!" Rogue muttered. "Okay, Kurt, here's what we're going to do to their room while they're out..."

* * *

A/N: And that is the end of Collision. A big thank you goes out to my reviewers, who kept me writing even when I wanted to stop. I realize that the romantic relationships were not fully fleshed out: romance is one of my biggest weaknesses, which is why I usually don't write it, and when I do, it's rather bad. Again, thank you to all my reviewers, and don't forget to leave constructive criticism.


End file.
